well, this is the first time writing in this diary...and i guess its about time. with all the places and months of travel me and julz have done it'd be good to share some of it with everyone...instead of in a paper diary. anyway, julz ended up in portland for work back in july 07, so we though it'd be a good idea for me to come on over and see what portlands all about. well, i flew out mid july into LA where i proceeded to see my first crazy event at LA domestic airport. i was walking past starbucks (off all places) and this dude suddenly convolted and dropped dead (he was pretty fat, not that theres anything wrong with that). i stopped along with about 50 others to watch this poor bloke get given cpr and then just as quickly pronouced "knocked out - its all over mate"!!! . the wierd thing about it all is that all 50 of us went in different directions none the wiser or terribly concerned.....very weird. well then i met up with julz in portland and its a pretty cool city. its a clean city with that good ol' grass roots feel. you can honestly walk out onto the road at any stage and your guaranteed not to get run over....great when you've had a few cheekies. portlands a very gay city, with the largest population of gays per capita...but its also got more stripclubs than vegas....go figure? another bizarre thing is that everything is perfectly manicured, down to the "lets carry our dogs instead of letting them walk". mind you, we had a great time there. we stayed in a hotel called "hotel monaco". now this is a very funky place thats decked out in vivid colours with spatterings of french decor and furniture. its a dog friendly hotel with its own blackboard at the front welcoming all new dogs, and also introducing other dogs.....(this city loves dogs....) we had a few days here so decided to hire a car and head out along the colombia river. i was wanting to hire a big ol' american muscle car (the dukes style with a throaty engine), but the dude at the hire place convinced me to hire a japper (mitsubishi). now i know your thinking how dull and unexciting passing up an american muscle car for a japper, but this was no ordinary japper...this was a mitsi spider. all i can say was what a machine. 2 door convertable, turbo and all the works - awesome. we headed out along the river and no bull...there were hundreds and hundreds of people kite surfing and wake boarding at the end of the river where it tapers and acts like this big wind tunnel. great fun to watch for a while until you get hungry and thirsty. we also drove up mt hood which was in the film "the shining" and then back to lovely clean manicured portland (apologies for the sarcasim). we saw norah jones in concert too.....that was pretty cool. btw, julz had an exciting time in the spider, managing to clock over 170km/hr......all caught on camera. we left portland and flew down to san fransico......now what a city this is. the last time julz and i were there was about 8 years ago, living in the back of a station wagon (1970 ford squire - chevy chase look-a-like, fake wooden panels etc), and being woken up with the annual "gay cycle around the bay ride". we ended up staying the hotel monaco here also....in style this time. we had 4 days in san fran and explored the whole city. its a great place to walk around and chill out in numerous funky shops. the cities like a combination of villages all brought together by the main road (name elludes me..) i know its pretty cliche, but walking up and over the golden gate is something else. we had wicked weather for all days in san fran and managed to get amazing views from the bridge. aparantly, the bay gets quite foggy but we must have been lucky. we were also there for the july 04th celebrations....and that was something else. i tell ya the yanks don't do anything by halves. there were simultanious fireworks going off in multiple places that were incredible. it was a good experience being there for that day. oh, i had a great cocktail that i must share. its called a "beetle juice" (bacardi - pinapple - madori). a few of those and your having a good time. anyway, all this typing is making me tired. so for the first blog, i hope its ok and we'll have many more from our next destination....central america. caio logz & julz | 