Drive South

(click on images for larger view)

After a soggy week in the Olympic rain forest I had a craving for somewhere sunny and dry so I am road tripping it in California until school starts up again in a week or so.
Here's a little hill I passed along the way. I can't tell if the picture turned out or not because the screen on this little laptop does not look like a normal monitor.










Here is a shot of the site where I camped.
It was a hike-in site (no cars) so it was mostly quiet except for the occassional noisy human...







...and a crow who was determined to annoy me every morning until I gave it some food (which I did not do).











This is the river that ran through the area as it is emptying into the Pacific Ocean...







Then after the sun went down it got dark very quickly.












A couple of nights I built a campfire and sat close to it because, although it was in the 70's during the day, once the sun went down it cooled off quickly and dropped to the upper thirties over night.






And after my week in the cold, wet rain forest on the Olympic Peninsula, this is the reason I went in the first place...

Olympic Peninsula

I just got back from a four day field trip with The Earth Stewards Program. We visited the Lower and Upper Elwah Dams, both of which are slated for removal some time in 2012. We also spent time in the rain forest and on the beaches of the untamed Washington coast. The power went out one night and left us in the dark. It was very nearly a monsoon with 80 mph winds driving the rain like bullets fired from a gun.
Here is a picture of a driftwood tree that washed up on the beach near our lodgings, taken after sundown. More pictures and video clips to follow.

Olympia Film Festival

Today I went down to The Olympia Film Festival presented by the Olympia Film Society (of which I am now a card carrying member) being held at The Capitol Theater. I wanted to see every movie on the docket for today but ended up seeing three. A movie at noon, a movie at 2:30, then a 4 pm dinner at Darby's Cafe which is located directly across from the Capitol Theater. I went home for an hour or so and came back for the 7 pm movie. The noon movie was Unmistaken Child , which is a film about the search a few years ago for the reincarnation of a Buddhist monk. I was interested in the numerous scenes of remote villages that Tenzin Zopa visited on his search for the reincarnated Tibetan master.
The 2:30 movie was called Alice. I think this is a Czechoslovakian film based on the story Alice in Wonderland. I'm going to say the jury is still out on whether I liked this movie or not. I think it would have been an excellent movie to see stoned to the bone because it was so odd and unexplainably quirky that I think it would have been a trip.
At 7pm I saw The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle by David Russo - a film maker from my home town of Seattle. I wanted to go right out and buy cookies. This was a funny and bizarre movie. It dealt with garbage and with the nature of modern day food using a squad of night janitors as a foil.

I have three movies left on my partial pass but I have not figured out which movies I will see . The film festival goes through November 14th so I have time to decide. Check it out if you're in Olympia this week.

And have a snack at Darby's. A classmate of mine works there but she was not there today. Some guy who called me "Doctor" (???) waited on me. Except for the "Doctor" thing he was a great waiter and the food was delicious.