July 9th, my boi cole arrives. shit i dont think we'd seen eachother since 2018. too friggin long doggy. fuck workin like like a friggin dawg at a desk not skatin.
set up a freshy to see how much damage i could do in 10 days.
the trusty golf. a lot of people have doubted this lil guy, but its killin it.
"oh my friggin god its friggin prefab shithole heaven"
the only place to trust burritos in WA - east of the cascades.
old sign porn
cole showed up with shoes beat to shit. didnt find any here to replace them. dunno how he got all those clips in those glorified canvas/rubber socks.
we showed up at this rv park at like 11:00 at night sweaty as shit. before climbing into my dirty ol' sleeping bag i stripped down and rinsed off with a gallon jug of water from the gas station. woke up and found out this place had showers.
old sign porn
yeah fuck urban renewal. thanks for holding onto #oldsignporn harry.
if you read the informational signage.
day 2. could be doin more damage.
stumbled upon a DIY in Wallace.
packed it all in like friggin 100 SF, wild.
alberton. the night before in coeur d'alene i started talking to this bikepacker at the gas station. he said he was moving slow because of the smoke. didnt notice it till we were in the thick of it in alberton, god damn it was rough. and hot.
escaped the smoke and heat at the local dive for pool and the world cup.
vehicle of choice.
skateshop tourism. This is when cole unvieled his vans shoe size conspiracy to me and the shopkeeps.
cole's disappointment in vans no longer fitting him was only seconded by the fact that the local surf shop didnt want to rent him a board to try the river surf because the wave was ass this time of year.
im sure you can find meaning in this bs photo of crumbling infrastructure and a new bank building.
this skate trip quickly turned into a burrito tour. not bad for a roadside coffee hut.
baldies watchin the bowl at stevensville.
hamilton mt, like abstract skate ramp concrete art. it looks like amorphous concrete blobs, but they fer sure kknkew where to launch people into the next blob.
im a sucker for berry crumble shit. red rooster, hamilton mt.
ahhhh lake como, mt... just like italy...
proably my favorite evergreen park ive hit. tucked behind a rodeo ring in the middle of nowhere. home of the darby derby. pool coping, airs, and a perfect lil ledge.
geodesic dome.
ruin porn.
after the bitterroot valley, we were on the hunt for some food only to be travelling through large swaths of nothing only to roll up to stores just closing. the only open door was the junkyard bistro in salmon ID. we lucked out that place was so damn good and cheap.
once again rolling up to the sleeping spot late and sweaty. talked up the water jug shower and cole went for it lmao. this spot was way colder than the first.
we stayed in this "primitive cabin" (no running water) in forks off of this family's dog grooming compound. They let us in in the morning to use the bathrooms. I took the biggest shit and showered. revitilizing for day 4.
lots of bike packers. i gotta do a big one sometime.
might've been the best burrito on the tour. red dog diner, salmon ID. filling, no frills, cheap, side of coffee.
its all about extremes. Salmon ID had the best and cheapest food on the route. It also had the worst friggin park ive been to. thats coming from a person who's local park growing up had an uphill euro gap that was better utilized as a ledge.
the roads to go east to butte were closed for fires. we ended up on some back country roads.
scrounging for sage.
he's always around.
butte has a lot of old beautiful buildings. you could tell it was boomin over here at one point. Today its shitty burritos, a bunch of bikers, and some attempts at preservation of its former self.
caught one skatin.
a mining museum.
"can i borrow your shoes?"
found some free coffee and the npr station in bozeman.
day 5. found burnside replica in big sky.
national parks is just fuckin nature disneyland.
haulin'
just fuckin zig zaggin b/w id and mt.
another round of jug showers. refreshing
lichen.
this tree trunk looks like a snail.
fields of dwarf buckwheat
so begins our hot springs tour in the sawtooths. we were skating a the sun valley skatepark in ketchum and ran into the dude who runs the "look back library". he was driving through on his own skate trip and was stoked on cole. he let us know there was a ton of hot springs around the area and we should seek them out. The first one we tried was a bit of a bust, but we got a river cool off to start.
the essentials.
found it! stop 1 - stanley. hidden behind some park on a dirt road. valley creek.
the bonneville tub. come on in.
some one had rigged up a pipe from this hot as hell spring into that shed to the tub.
cole and i were chillin in these tubs for a bit. i had closed my eyes for a couple minutes and i opened them up to seeing a snake abobut 5 feet from me just staring me down. i snapped up and he stole my friggin spot. dude claimed the tub. these were for sure the best tubs and no one in sight. bonneville campground.
kirkham pools - big ol bummer in comparison to bonneville.
contemporary real graphics never fail to disappoint.
an out of focus day 7.
pulled neil outta beaverton to skate around dowtown portland! my old haunt circa 2015/16, the blue moon tavern. i managed to never get good at pool despite the several opportunities. cole kicked my ass at every table on this trip.
drinkin' beer goin through neil's files on cole.
neil and his ramp. catch ya later doggy!
to the coast. choo choo baby.
point break beach lmao.
some big ol' dummy tried bringing their home one wheels down the narrow ravine.
wouldn't have been a road trip without sleeping at a rest stop one night...
this photo doesn't do it justice as to how dusted these vans are.
dreamland parks.
astoria on a sunday. liveliest ive ever seen this town in my 6 years out here.
after 9 days mostly subsisting on burritos, even a sugar filled smoothie felt like health.
dive bar oysters, lets go.
only on the coast will you still find cash only spots in covid. i left my card in the atm across the street like a big ol dummy. whatever, oysters and beer were worth it.
ERIC. found this long lost creature in the backwoods of olympia thriving.
pickle. feral as ever.
eric recounting his peruvian excursion. then took us to his trails with pickle. best way to end this trip..
goodnight cole. british columbia skate tour next summer. but i'll catch your before then fckr.
footage from the last time cole and i did a trip like this together 5 or so years ago in here. let's make another one happen sooner.