Starting from Quartz Hill, California, I headed north to the PNW then started traveling towards the east coast before traveling down to DC where I made my way back home to prepare for the winter.
Along my way I met up with some Cali friends and family for a ST Patrick's day Celebrations, visited Lake Tahoe, got some free cheese at the Tillamook Factory, and did some float tubing in Bend, OR.
Moving east, I made some new friends camping outside of Glacier National Park where I hiked for 12 hot and dusty miles that luckily ended in what was the most refreshing stream I ever had the privilege to wade in. In the Dakota's I saw some artwork of epic proportions along the Enchanted Highway, and a ton of farms. After some medical issues just past the border into Michigan's UP, I stayed with a friend's family on the 'Pinky' for a few days of food, fun, and Michigan factoids. After meeting up with one of my mom's Camino family members in Bowling Green, Ohio, I toured the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, biked into Canada to look at Niagara falls (I highly recommend Chubbie's Jerkhouse if you want to avoid the Niagara funhouse tourist hell that is the Canadian side of the park).
Watkins Glen State Park gets its own line break. All the best parts of the Narrows in Zion National Park but with a ton of lush greenery and (albeit a bit lucky on my part) plenty of light rain that made for a ton of great long exposure photography involving the mini waterfalls and trickles of water falling into the canyons. Highly recommend! Shout out to Green Shirt Guy.
Continuing east, I brought the Michigan family pickles to the Michigan family recommended Break and Puppet Theater where I volunteered in their print shop and visited their barn 'museum'. After that I went to the most Northeast point of my trip where I brought my loaned copy of Gerald’s game to its source at Stephen King's home in Maine where I also started down a path of non stop seafood and seafood-centered gluttony. In between lobster roll bites I managed a few hours of walking around the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens which were absolutely beautiful! Another big recommendation if you have the chance.
In New York I got stuck in over two hours of Manhattan traffic to travel 20 miles to my friends' house on Long Island where I was met with flooding. I got to explore the city a bit and take some photos of the different buildings and interesting sights. I long for more cities to have transit that works anywhere as well as the NY Subways... although I would settle for better access to bagels and lox.
I traveled south down to Baltimore, Maryland where I got my bike stolen (well 90% of it, they left some bolts and the back tire) in the first 11 hours of visiting a friend from College. Otherwise it was a nice city with a wonderful art museum so it wasn't all that bad in the end. I met up with some of the east coast family as well as some other college friends and we hit all of the major monuments and museums before I started back west.
At this point "The great coast to coast sprint" began as I darted back to California to make it back in time for the yearly High School friend group camping trip. along the way I visited Mammoth Caves National Park, Gateway Arch """""""National Park""""""", went to my first renaissance fair with some friends, swung by the old stomping grounds in Colorado, and arrived home to my parents place with their 8 cats.
After the camping trip in Big Bear, I visited a few friends in Arizona, saw a Meow Wolf in New Mexico, did some hot springing in Truth or Consequences, ski-bummed around Colorado's Ikon Pass resorts, and slowly became a not awful snowboarder!
At the moment I am back in Colorado and trying to get back to normal life after a year of exploration, both physical and internal, with memories of friends, family, sights, sounds, food, fun, and so much more. And no I didn't purposely draw a penis with bayonet with my journey it just happened that way.