part 1 of 2 | I PROMISE THERE WILL BE ONLY TWO

i've been realizing a few things while reviewing these photos from the redwoods. one is that i was wearing a beanie, an oversized wolf sweatshirt, and the most comfortable sweats from target and as you can see in the photos, i looked nothing short of just dashing. in my defense, it's just weird to wear clothes that look better than they feel when on a road trip.

if you are lucky enough to own attractive comfy clothes (jared)/are able to pull off looking amazing in your comfortable clothes (jared), then i bow to you. but for me, hi, i'm 25 years old, i hate the ads on pandora but refuse to pay $4 a month so i don't have to listen to them, i still stay up unreasonably late at least once a week, and i wear oversized wolf sweatshirts and sweats with mustards stains on them on road trips. welcome to my blog.

jared wore his usual jeans and a button-up so most of the photos i have are of him. he claims, "but jeans are comfortable! this button-up is comfortable!"

the second thing i realized is that road trips without time limits or set in stone destinations are NOTHING SHORT OF TRULY FANTASTIC. but i think key to the success of such a road trip is roaming a large area of god-ordained beautiful land. the california-orgeon coast is riddled with such beauty. our trip was perfect except that it was twelve days too short.

the last two are my #thenorthface #neverstopexploring pics even though i really might love #patagonia more for their awesome blog and rad approach to celebrating the things you already own.

i won't waste your time or mine by spelling out all the details of the absolute unnecessary hassle i went through this last week with google and their all-star customer service for this blog. in a tiny little nutshell, my custom domain expired because google has 35,000 employees and none to help someone who only pays them $10 a year for her domain. if you didn't notice, my blog was down for a few days. and then, like that, it wasn't! i'm still not even sure what went down that google decided to let it exist again, but something did happen and now i do have a blog again!

here are the last of our california coast road trip photos. and just you wait for another 10 million photos over the course of the coming weeks. also, the last few days without a blog made me realize how many times i have thoughts i want to put on this blog but end not putting on this blog. i want to chronicle more of my thoughts here. i think i will forever love my blog.

oh and i know that in a few years i will look back and wonder why i felt compelled to share a thousand photos that look extremely similar. and i know, i know, i know, i know, i know i will roll my eyes that these photos are so highly-edited and filtered. i know. but i like them now and now will always trump later.

CALIFORNIA COAST ROAD TRIP // part 1 (of 2)

we left san francisco and headed straight up the coast on our journey toward portland. we had two days to mosey our way here, so we made sure to enjoy the views, stop along the way, and of course we camped in the redwoods.

when there was road work that brought us to a complete halt for fifteen minutes, there was no stressed out worrying that we were getting behind schedule or going to be late for anything. we just turned up the music and munched on snacks.

it's pretty thrilling throwing out the window any pressure to make an itinerary and just going where you end up. we didn't have a road map or even look at google maps until we actually hit the road (and the 4g was spotty, at that) and then we adjusted routes based on recommendations we got from the guy who changed our oil and the lady who checked us in at the campground who had already enjoyed her second glass of wine for the evening. not having to accomodate to other people's schedules or even our own, the spontaneous, play-it-by-ear plan was seriously just fun.

we took highway 1. literally. like, #1, as in the very first highway of america, basically, is how is felt. the road wound in and out of coastal views with small bursts of straight distances. it was gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous. the whole coast is lined with tiny bed and breakfast towns and hippie hitchhikers. the highway is lined with dreadlocks, baja ponchos, and backpacking backpacks GALORE. you could also point your finger randomly on a map of the coast and any little town you pick out could be a charming weekend escape. the closer you get to oregon the more flannel and fog you see, like clockwork. there were an impressive number of touring cyclists with their pannier packs and even laundry detergent buckets in place of pannier packs sometime. we were extra aware of the cyclists because we dream of doing a bicycle tour some day in the distant or not-so-distant future. that will have to come after i run that half marathon.

we kept coming up with reasons to stay on the coast forever.

"let's get hired by a campground to be the camp managers and explore the redwood forest all day. just for a year or two. or three."

"we should buy a little house out here hidden in the forest and sell jerky to folks on the road. that would be the life."

"let's save up money and spend an entire summer driving the coast in our westy." (our yet to exist westy)

le sigh. traveling is beautiful.