I've completed most of my adventures down Highway 101, looking for
and hiding a blizard of boxes. =)

Before leaving Portland, I tried to nab Funhog's Hidden Dragon box,
but to no avail. Where I thought the box was located was
approximately five feet from where some maintenance workers were
working, so being indiscreat was hard. I suspect they were looking
at me with highly suspicious looks. And when I did finally try to
check out the area, I didn't find the box. Is it missing? Was I
looking in the wrong spot? Or was it so far in that crevess I
couldn't reach it? We may never know....

However, I did find Funhog's Bluebird Trail letterbox. Watched a
beautiful sunset from there. I stopped by on April 1st, and it had
one of those ticket dispenses. Put three bucks in and out pops your
day pass. I noticed the date stamp was March 32nd. I'm not sure if
that was meant as an April Fool joke or if there was a glitch in
their system, but I've saved the ticket as proof. =)

I also tried checking up on my Wappato Island Mystery box, mostly
because so many people seem to have visited it! (At least six that I
know of!) Unfortunately, it seems to be MISSING! *sobbing* Yes, I
hunted all around for it and the box is gone. It didn't last long,
but I'm glad so many people got to visit it in its short lifespan! =)

Alas, I had to leave without finding the series the Traveling Circus
was in the process of hiding. *sigh*

Then I headed out to Lincoln City, nabbing the Devil's Lake State
Park letterbox. Beautiful stamp! It sadly hasn't been visited
often. Just two yahoos from Colorado until I showed up. =) But the
box is alive and well, and the stamp is definitely worth nabbing!
Adorable! =)

The next couple hundred miles I spend hiding four letterboxes. I've
posted clues for one of them already, but more will be forthcoming.

Then I decided to nab the ultra-elusive boxes at Paradise Lodge,
placed by Don and Gwen. My first Don and Gwen boxes--I HAD to nab
those! =) They mentioned rafting in to the place, and an airstrip
nearby you could fly into. Being a spur-of-the-moment decision, I
settled for hiking in. I'm now suffering from a few blisters since
25 miles of hiking is a bit excessive, even for me, but I happily
nabbed both boxes. Very cute stamps, too. =) The river looks like
it would have make a fabulous rafting trip! I'll have to try it
again someday, using the raft instead of my feet. =) Not
surprisingly, not many people have visited these very off-the-beaten-
track letterboxes.

Northern California seems devoid of letterboxes along Highway 101,
but that's okay, because after that 25 mile hike, I was ready for
some serious driving time. =) As an aside, if you find an Oregon
license plate XFL 310 on Highway 101 in southern Oregon or northern
California, it's MINE!

That got me to Santa Rosa late in the afternoon the next day. Nabbed
the Sugarloaf letterbox, alive and well. The Annadel State Park box
appears to be missing, though. In fact, the area where it was
supposed to be was torn up pretty badly from someone obviously
looking for the box. Very sad. It's people like this that make park
administrators not want letterboxing in their area. Whoever did that
damage is on my Dumb Bastard of the Week list. Sometimes, I think a
missing letterbox causes more damage than ones that are there!

Then I headed off to Bay Wildlife Refuge series. Speaking of which,
if you're looking for a place to sleep in that area, the cops
informed that there's an ordinance in Newark making it against the
law to sleep in your car anywhere in the city. And they WILL wake
you up at 2:30 in the morning by shining large spotlights into your
eyes and inform you of this. =)

The first box of the series was reported missing, and I agree since I
couldn't find it. Got the second one okay. The third one, which was
there as far as I knew, I wasn't able to find. I'm not entirely sure
if my search just wasn't thorough enough or if it's really missing.
In any case, I did get letterbox #2 of the series.

And then I headed over the bay to nab the two boxes at Palo Atlo that
were reported as still being there. Happy to say, I nabbed them
both. Biggest honking stamps I ever did see, too. =)

And last, I headed out towards Santa Cruz to nab the Loma Prieta
Earthquake letterbox. My eyes nearly popped out when I saw the size
of this letterbox. I thought it was a geocache the thing is so
honking big! (You KNOW it's big if I call it "honking" big.) If you
have a stereo system you want to store, it might fit in this box.
=) In any case, it's a wonderfully put together box including
information about the earthquake, 911 transcripts, pictures of some
of the damage, etc. It's been a very well visited box, however it
seems only Pam and Todd are the only ones were were actually looking
for it. The box does explain what letterboxing is and to "stamp in
and sign your name", which is exactly what all the visitors did.
They stamped the log with the stamp inside the letterbox (ink pad
provided), and many pages are now covered with that one stamp image
over and over again. Very amusing. =)

I was going to nab the letterbox at Morgan Hill, but it was starting
to get late and I wanted to reach San Luis that evening. However, I
do go through Morgan Hill several times a year, and I figured that
one could wait until another day.

Still have about 200 miles left of traveling before I reach Los
Angeles (my final destination), but it's been a wonderful adventure
so far! =) Thanks to everyone who helped provide information on the
boxes that were there (or not!).

Farewell!

-- Ryan