McKinleyville Cousins!

With 48 days remaining, I'm busy doing laundry and recovering from a whirlwind just-over-24-hour visit with my cousin Mike's family up in McKinleyville. They took me for a few little hikes in the area, introducing me to a couple state parks on the coastline, and further cementing the love affair I feel that I'm having with the Pacific Coast. What would my mountains say?

The trip started with a 6am alarm clock, hopping out of bed and into my clothes, throwing some food down my gullet and my things (already laid out the night before) into my bag. Shortly after 6:30 I was out the door attempting, just at the very butt-crack of dawn, to locate the trailhead without a flashlight and very little ambient lighting. After a little hesitance I was on the trail and headed for Weott, my way growing clearer by the minute as my eyes adjusted and daylight slowly seeped into my surroundings. I made it to the bus stop with at least ten minutes to spare. An hour on the bus brought me to Eureka, and another fourty-five to McKinleyville, where cousin Mike and his 1-1/2-year-old son Jasper were waiting to meet me. It was a short walk to their house, and a short distance from their house to the coast and all sorts of public lands up and down it.

Jasper, who reminded me so much of my nephew Cade, was a highly entertaining fellow during my visit! :)

Mike, his wife Susanna, and I had a lot of catching up to do since, we realized, we hadn't actually seen each other since 2006... eight years! That's almost a decade, and it's crazy to think that I can say that sort of thing. They've done lots of traveling, in the U.S. and abroad, and it was inspiring to look at their photos and hear their stories of adventures. We also had lots of good conversations about work and jobs and hiring and the like... it was information from Mike and Susanna that first helped me to get my foot in the door working for parks, and their stories as well as their advice are a great encouragement as I continue to try to land seasonal work with the National Park Service.

 This morning we went to Patrick's Point State Park, where I became obsessed with snagging photos of seaspray on rocks. I think this was my most successful shot where that is concerned, though I'm not too keen on the positioning of everything in the shot... definitely not very well aligned in my photo. We got back home in time for lunch, some conversation, and then it was back to the bus stop by 1 o'clock to catch the bus back down to Eureka. I spent a little under an hour picking up some groceries before the Southern Humboldt bus came around to take me back to Weott, where I soldiered out onto the trail once more to hike back to my humble abode. It was an amazing weekend, full of beautiful sights and good conversation (and good food!), and insanely summer-like weather to boot! (Although this latter bit proved to be my undoing, since I had packed for cooler weather and as a result was forced to fill my bag to bursting with my cooler weather clothes and wear what was left in spite of the heat.) Now it's back to work tomorrow, and as soon as next weekend starts, Jack will be up here to celebrate my birthday with me and we'll be off on another adventure.

Baby Banana Slug! (if you're in my immediate family, please read that with the same voice as "Baby Buffalo" or "Baby Banana";)

On the job front, there are developments, more or less. I've gotten multiple inquiries for "interest and availability", to which I have responded promptly that I am both interested and readily available. Word is that the trailhead positions I want SO BADLY to work are going to be interviewing next week, so please keep me in your thoughts and prayers that I will get some good news very soon. I will have to tell my boss here sometime in the next week whether or not I intend to stay on through the whole summer, so it'd be really nice if I had something definite when that conversation comes up. Hopefully the next time I post on here I will have some (good) news to share with regards to that!

Until next time!