Earlier this week I went to Countryside Christian Church and interviewed Jerry Christiansen and John Thompsen.  Jerry Christiansen used to work at Parkcrest Christian Church, which is my home church, but he has been up here in Oregon for about 10 years.

The interview went fine, but the cool thing is that yesterday Jerry and I went for a ride all through the mountains here around the Salem Area of Oregon.  We did about 200 miles yesterday, riding from Keizer to Estacada then to Detroit and then back to Salem.  It was an absolutely gorgeous ride, and I was having a great time riding, until about 15 miles north of Detroit when a bee flew into my helmet and stung me in the eyebrow.

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Well I am working at the state fair, but it is my appointment only.  There is a horse show here that lasts all 11 days of the fair, and there are about 60 -80 classes (different horse show competitions) each day.  In all honesty, I think it is really ridiculous, but what I do is if someone asks, I film their show.  So on busy days I may film quite a few, but today I don’t have any sign ups, at least not any so far.  Its kind of nice cause then I have some free time, to do whatever I want.  I will be working here till labor day, and then shortly after that I will start heading south.

For now I am living in a tent at the state fair.  Its pretty fun, and we like to tell people that we meet at the fair, that we live here.  By we I mean my buddy Sammy from college, and I.

I don’t have a lot of pictures, but I do have this fun little video.

Well I made it!  Monday night around 9pm (Pacific Time) I pulled into the driveway of my dads house in Long Beach marking the end of my adventure.  Since Monday I have been hanging out with all my old friends, gone to school for orientation, and ate a lot of food!  No time for rest!  School starts for the semester this coming Tuesday and I am looking forward to being back on a regular schedule.

My path from Oregon was great, Started off the trek home by having a great dinner with Dave and Chisti, can’t ride motorcycles hungry!  I left there house fairly early Friday morning and made it 430 miles to Eureka, Ca.  I was pretty sore after that but saw some good sites along the coast.

Saturday was an average day of 200 miles but it was pretty hot.  I met up with Dustin, Heather and their kids in Santa Rosa.  Great people whom I wouldn’t mind seeing more often.  Dustin made Carne Asada which I haven’t had since leaving Cali, hit the spot.  I went to church with them Sunday morning and got her Dustin speak and spent a little of time answering questions for the high school group.  I had an outstanding time in Santa Rosa.

Later Sunday I rode a whopping 80 miles to San Mateo to see Dave and Angela Radford, Dave being a good friend who I’ve known since Jr. High.  Had a good time catching up with them.  Oh I almost forgot, I had In N Out for lunch and dinner on Sunday.  It has been so long but yet it feels like I never left In N Out, they still taste as great as I remember.  While I was at the Radford’s I got a call from my dad saying he wasn’t feeling to good and that he might not be able to meet n Morro Bay like planned.  Were going to wait and see how he feels in the morning.

I called my pops around 9am to see what he wanted to do and we came up with the game plan of meeting at an In N Out in Newhall, CA (Magic Mountain for you So Cal people) and go the rest of the way home from there.  I had lunch with Dave and left around 1:30pm for my 400 mile ride.  Finally got to Newhall around 7pm.  It was great seeing my Dad for the first time in months!  After dinner we finished the ride together.  It was really fun to ride with my dad, he rode out with us on the very first day back in March and then he finished the trip back with me 5 months later.

Maybe I should have wrote this in the beginning but there really has been some culture shock in being home.  I have experienced life to the fullest, living by the seat of my pants for 5 months and now I’m back home.  It feels like just yesterday I was curled up in the fetus position in Michigan waiting out a thunder storm in my tent.

So for a few statistics:  I rode a total of 19, 335 miles over the course of the trip, used approx. 400 gallons of fuel, 1 ticket (Fix it ticket thank you CHP), rode a motorcycle in every state, and a whole lot more but those are the big ones.

Thank you to all for your support in this crazy adventure!  I can’t even begin to thank all the people who helped along the way but you all know who you are and you should all know that this trip could not have happened without all your help.  Thank you.

Ryan

Well I got back to Monmouth some time Monday afternoon.  I have been staying with my friend Zach, his wife Emily and their daughter Chloe.  My friend Zach says I have to do chores as my rent to stay there.  The first day I edged their lawn, yesterday I brought him lunch at the farm that he works on, and today I mowed the back yard.  I actually like this arrangement, but I am sure I will be moving on eventually.

Sammy, another friend from College, drove up here Tuesday cause he is going to be working at the State fair in Salem, which is about 20 minutes form here.  The two of us hung out yesterday, and it was a pretty productive day.  We went fishing in the morning with Zach’s friend Matt, then Sammy took me and another one of Zach’s friend’s, Kyle, off roading through some  back roads here in Monmouth.  After that the three of us rode bicycles over to Kyle’s house, I was on a tandum bike with Kyle which was pretty interesting.  We went over there to chop fire wood.  Chopping wood is actually pretty fun, but it does take some hand eye cordination, which is not exactly one of my strengths.  It was a fun day.

This afternoon I am going to head into Salem to see about working at the state fair with Sammy.  Sammy is going to be the photographer, and I might be the videoographer.  So I will be sure to post that up here as soon as I know what I will be doing for the next couple weeks.  As of now, I still don’t know when I am coming home, cause I haven’t known exactly how long I was going to be up here.  Maybe I will be able to put a schedule together tomorrow.

Friday I headed to Seaside OR.  My good buddy from college Zach, and his family rented a vacation house there, and so I came to crash the party.  I had a good time just hanging out on the beach with him, and his new exteneded family.  We had a bonfire, played at the arcade, and spent a lot of time playing with Zach and his wife Emily’s 5 month old daughter, Chloe.

(Here is a picture of me on my way to Seaside)

This morning I left Seaside and headed towards Seattle, or more specifically Issaquah.  On my way I stopped by Long Beach WA.

I am staying with Doug again who we stayed with about 3 weeks ago.  I came back up here cause I have an interviewed scheduled with Mike Howerton from Overlake Christian Church.  After the interview I will be heading back south again to Monmouth OR to hang out with Zach and his family some more, before I start slowly making my way down south.  I would like to get a temp job in Salem, and hang out here longer.  I really like the northwest, and the smaller towns.  Life is just a lot simpler, but there are also a lot of things that are not as easy to come by, so it is a trade off.

Well we got into Portland around 7pm last night.  Dave and Christy Lerwick picked us up from the airport, took us out to dinner, and let us stay the night at their house.  It is a wonderful blessing to have friends and family all over this country.

Today Ryan headed home.  School starts for him in just a matter of days, so he needed to start heading back.

I on the other hand, have no reason to get home, so I am slowly making my way home, and I am starting by going North instead of south.  I still have several interviews to do, and one of them is in the Seattle area.  I will be going back up there on Sunday, and then coming back down to Monmouth on Monday.  I do not have an exact schedule yet, but I do know everywhere I am going to stop on the way home, the problem is that I have not yet decided how long to stay in each place, especially how long to stay here in the Portland area.  I really like this area, and so I am not in a rush to leave it, especially since I have a lot of good friends up here.

Here is all the places I plan on stopping at on my way home:

• Medford, OR
• Monterey Bay, California
• Redwood National Park
• Redding, CA
• Brentwood, CA
• San Mateo, CA
• San Luis Obispo, CA
• Fresno, CA (Maybe)
• LONG BEACH, CA

As soon as I figure out how long I am staying everywhere, I will keep you all up to date on my schedule, but as of now it feels very freeing to not have to be anywhere.

Well when we first landed I told you how we were greeted by Roy and his friend Bill.  Well here is a picture of our new friend Roy.  He was a great help to us here on the island, and an all around fun guy.

Roy serves at New Hope Oahu, and helped us get an interview with Elwin Ahu, the Executive Pastor of New Hope Oahu.  It was a great interview, and make sure you stay tuned for the story he shares at the end.  It really is an amazing story of God’s forgiveness and how He can bring people together from all walks of life.

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