May 28, 2008 – Bend, OR – Attentive readers of this website have noted a lack of content dating back almost 3 weeks. The editors of this site wish to apologize for that lack of content and offer the following excuse(s):

Leo, Basey, Vin, and Jamie have moved off of BigBus and onto more stable ground in Bend, OR. After 15,000 miles and almost as many dollars in Diesel Oil, it was time for your heroes to fulfill their collective promise of returning to dry land. BigBus is now resting in Orange County, CA where she will hopefully be adopted by new parents, hopefully very soon. As for Whippets and people, we rented a U-haul and drove back to Bend, Oregon, where we intend to stay.

Everything described in the previous paragraph sounds tidy as I write, but the events so described were not tidy at all. They included, but were not limited to: much driving and re-driving of Interstate-5, triple digit temperatures in Los Angeles, packing and packing again boxes that have been moved 4 times in 12 months, bus repairs and car repairs and ill-timed Memorial Day Weekend travels.

So that’s about it. This will be the last post I write with news of BigBus adventures. We have moved on to other adventures now, possibly requiring a new website title. Thanks to everyone who kept up with our travels, we will be in touch –

Jamie Basey Leo Vin

NEW CONTACT INFO: 578 NW Greyhawk Ave., Bend, OR 97701

(541) 647-0008 basey • (541) 647-0580 Jamie

May 11, 2008 – Redwoods National Park, CA – Here are some photos of really large trees.  Redwoods National and State parks represent the only old growth Redwoods left in the country.  In the past 150 years somebody cut down all but 4% of Americas giant Redwoods.  Some of these trees are 2000 years old and 350′ tall.

May 08, 2008 – Humbug Mountain State Park, OR – BigBus arrived back on the Pacific today, currently nestled into a campground near the beach.  Anyone who has not seen enough photos of Whippets running on a beach can click above.

May 08, 2008 – Roseburg, OR – **UPDATE** – More Roseburg photos added above.  Basey and I returned to Bend for a few days, then back to Roseburg.  We left this morning for the Oregon coast, but not before celebrating Geoff’s 38th (a few days early).

April 29, 2008 – Roseburg, OR – Greetings from Southern Oregon. BigBus arrived in Roseburg proper on Friday after a romantic evening in the back lot of Southern Oregon Diesel. Cousin Geoff lives atop a very steep hill and enjoys majestic views from his (and Vanessa’s) manor. One might expect us to sit atop the manor deck all day and never venture out. Not so. Your heroes have been quite active, accomplished much since arriving here, not the least of which was walking a mile in high-heels for a rape awareness benefit. That’s me in the heels, not Basey, She’s never worn heels in her life.

April 29, 2008 – Roseburg, OR – Last week featured a few days in Bend, OR, which was nice. For some reason I didn’t take many photos, but we did some fun stuff – drove up to see Mt. Bachelor, for example, and spent a few hours at the Living Desert Museum. Note the addition of Gudrun to our traveling coterie. She mounted BigBus in Hood River and rode it all the way to Eugene, which makes her our longest bus apprentice yet. Basey enjoyed having a girl to talk to after 9 months on the road with me.

April 20, 2008 – Bend, OR – Above find photos of our week in the Columbia River Gorge. The Gorge is fast becoming a serious wine-making region due to Mediterranean weather and the vision and labors of small farmers/wine makers like Poppie and James. They founded Syncline Wine almost 10 years ago and now run the operation on their land in Lyle, where BigBus snuggled in with the grapes last week. We had a good time playing with 4-year-old Ava, many hikes, a day of skiing, and much erudite study of wine.

**BABY UPDATE** Another baby added. See if you can find your own baby in the crowd. If you’re just joining us, these are all the kids (less than or equal to 4-years old) we’ve visited on our journey across this fertile nation.

April 19, 2008 – Bend, OR – Today BigBus swerved south from Hood River to Bend after a great week at the Syncline Winery with family Mantone. Gudrun arrived from LA yesterday to travel in our circus for a while. So now there are five.

This post is about a spring skiing jaunt to Mt. Hood last Tuesday where instead of spring skiing we received a serious mountain blizzard. I guess this is normal April behavior for Mt. Hood, so the skiing portion of the program quickly gave way to Hot Chocolate drinking inside Timberline Lodge. Being inside Timberline this time of year is akin to walking into a snow cave. Most of the lodge is drifted over with snow so many 2nd and 3rd story windows are buried under same. See photos above, take note of the Quonset Hut entrance they employ to keep snow from entombing the entire building.

April 16, 2008 – Lyle, Washington – This post will cover last week’s travel. Currently BigBus is harbored in Lyle, WA on the Columbia River Gorge. We’ve been here 5 nights already, but I’m catching up on the blog. Lyle will get it’s own post. This post is about Mt. Saint Helens and Portland, OR. First, the Volcano: Despite visiting Mt. Saint Helens, we couldn’t actually see it. This because clouds and rain prevailed both days.  They did have many helpful photos in the Visitor Center, so we came away with a general understanding of the Mountain in question.  April weather in the Pacific NW is really horrible.

Then on to Portland. We spent 3 days in Portland and it stopped raining long enough to take one photo. It’s the one of Basey eating a giant doughnut (See above). Aside from it’s rainy weather, Portland is a great city. If Portland had a dome over it, I might want to live there.

April 5, 2008 – Port Angeles, WA – Today Basey turned 35, went for a snow hike, bathed in the Sol Duc Hot Springs, wore a birthday hat, and ate one-third of an Ice Cream Cake.