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(from an email from Andy Davis) hey all! most of you probably thought that i either fell off the face of the earth or died-- or more likely, managed to do both at the same time. well surprise! i am alive and well in portland. it was a long hard journey here: i had to fight off a bout of typhoid, ford rivers, and even defend myself from raiding thieves attempting to steal boxes of clothes in the night. 
*quick* synopsis of my recent life/journey: after graduating in december i spent the holidays say fair-wells to family and friends and loading all of my possessions into my newly acquired prius (thank's dad). i ended up surprising even myself with the small volume of things i decided that i needed to survive, and had enough room left in the car to see out the windows! when i started driving, i thought i may have had typhoid, but it turned out to just be a head cold that was gone in a couple days. so much for a dramatic start to the oregon trail...
i took a southerly route so as to meet up with bunch of friends to climb with in red rock canyon, nevada (just outside of vegas). this is where the river fording came in-- it rained for two or three days and some of the desert roads were washing out slightly. i know, not as dramatic as a 'real' trip on the oregon trail, but my car has a lot less ground clearance than a covered wagon... highlights were definitely climbing 'solar slab' with connie (it had been far too long since we did a long route together) and spending a rather crazy night out in vegas with randy (former roommate). somehow we didn't get kicked out of any casinos, still shocks me. oh, and be sure to drive slow around red rocks. we had to deal with a long, harassing traffic stop from a ranger for driving 22mph in a 15. as a disclaimer, anyone with a shred of common sense would guess the speed limit to be 55; and OF COURSE i slowed WAY down when i saw the ranger, he was parked in the middle of the road and it's always a bad idea to hit a cop.
after leaving redrocks, i took a detour through berkely to see justin, who i lived with for my first four years of college. it turns out that berkely is not the nicest part of the san francisco area (really ghetto), so i am not exaggerating a bit when i say i had to worry about thieves in the night.
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