We were driving south on Highway 101, heading down the coast to San Francisco. I had learned the day before that we were passing through the proposed state of Jefferson. The story goes back to 1941. A group of four counties in southwest Oregon and three in northern California, feeling that their beliefs were being underrepresented by their respective state governments, decided to split off and create their own state called Jefferson. These counties are rural and Republican. Politics in Oregon and California tends to follow what is happening in the populous urban areas that lean Democratic. The intended split…

We hit the road early, singing just about every California-related song we could think of. There are plenty. We crossed through Oregon's Willamette valley again, heading southwest to the California border. Upon entering the Golden State, we were stopped at a checkpoint and questioned about what we were carrying with us - fruit, meat, that sort of thing. It felt like we were entering a new country. We may as well have been. California is so big that if it were its own country, it would have the world's fifth largest economy, ahead of the UK and France. It is…

We traveled south from Portland into the Willamette Valley (emphasis on the second syllable for some reason: wil-LAM-ette). This 250km-long valley follows the Willamette river flowing from south to north, feeding the Columbia River near Portland. The valley is home to 70% of Oregon's population and is a highly productive agricultural region, owing to regular flooding with rich glacial and volcanic soil about 14,000 years ago. Berries, vegetables, hops, Christmas trees, hazelnuts and much more are grown in abundance in this fertile soil. It has also become a well known wine-producing area. I'm not sure what this guy was up…

Portland is an unusual and unique place with its own culture. In our three-day stay in Oregon's largest city (pop: 2.4 million), we attempted to uncover what exactly that was. I'll start with coffee, which is a big deal here. It seems that 'local' is the way to a Portlander's wallet. While researching the 'best coffee' in town, this turned out to be a contentious topic. But the local chain 'Stumptown Coffee Roasters' seems a strong contender. The founder is known to visit coffee farms in person and regularly overpay for beans. I'm not sure why, but this seems to…

The greater Seattle area is all built around water - the broad Puget Sound, large bays, inlets, canals, rivers, and lakes. If you look at Washington state on a map, it looks like the hand of Neptune has ripped out chunks of land in the top left quadrant. Perhaps the Olympic Mountain range blocked his assault. We spent some time in the city of Tacoma. Like Seattle (50km further north), Tacoma sits on the Puget Sound and feels like its surrounded by water and thick forests. The west coast is also home to the 'Jack in the Box' fast food…

After a grueling border interrogation, we entered the vast green forests of Washington state. Our first stop was Boeing’s Everett factory, about 40km north of Seattle. This is the largest building in the world by volume, purpose-built to assemble Boeing’s giant 747s (aka the Jumbo Jet). Tours of the plant have been going since it opened in the late 1960s, and we hopped on one to investigate. The tour was slick – you are on a trolley, then up lifts to viewing decks of the factory floor below, then shown videos and hear interesting stories about the place. The plant…

After a very busy period, we treated our four day stay in Vancouver as a major unwind. Preceded by lots of exploring, driving, hiking, sight-seeing, and decision-making, we chose to have a peaceful few days by the Pacific Ocean. This involved grocery shopping and home cooking, catching a movie at the cinema, putting some thought into the markets, as well as lots of chilling. But, being travel bugs, we couldn’t help but do at least one interesting thing each day. The first of these was stopping into an old friend’s coffee shop in the heart of Vancouver’s downtown. The place…

Lake Louise is a ridiculously beautiful lake about 60km northwest of the town of Banff, and was our hiking destination for the day. To beat the crowds, we got up super early and set off from Banff. With the sun rising behind us, we passed under an unusual sight - a bridge spanning the highway that was built for animals to cross. Nice touch Canada. Lake Louise is a "glacial lake", which is a lake carved by glacial erosion and then filled up with water as the glacier melts. The lake is still fed by glacial runoff, and in turn,…