This last week and a half have been an exciting ride. From the road trip up to Sacramento and Shasta with Aaron, to the wineries of Ensenada, nothing was short of exciting and surprising. This trip can be broken down in to 3 distinct sections. Road trip to Aaron's, Mt Shasta, and Ensenada. Lets go in chronological order.

Road Trip to Aaron's


This idea was nothing but last minute. I knew he was leaving monday, but I didn't decided till extremely late sunday that I was going to head out with him to his home town Sacramento. My orginal plan was to head up with Peter and Ty to climb Mt Shasta, but of course they flaked. This opened the door to the adventure me and Aaron had. The trip up was filled with fun chats about this and that. The time spent driving was time spend bonding. His Jeepster Commando trucked along the hot day with little problems, until we stopped at subway. The Jeep's Clutch would not disengage when the car was on. With his handy tools and his dad's know how, they managed to fix it. (His dad flew down monday, rented a car and was driving behind us) Once fixed we hopped back into the convertible and drove towards Loomis, Ca.

Aaron's house is a kid's dream house. Tons of space to roam and play hunter. A pool to swim in, a weight room, a archery Range, breezy house. Man.. Aaron has it all in his little plot of land. Its located in a great location too. 3 minutes from the lake and 4 minutes from nice shopping. The weather there was nice and fair. Warm days followed by cooling night air made it really easy to sleep.

-Drug Effects-
I took diamox, a med normally used for cataracts. It is also often used for altitude travel. However, I experience every side effect it had. Tingling in extremities, and change in taste of soda. I thought it was the soda mixture.. but it was me. haha

Mt Shasta


My ultimate goal for heading north was to summit the 2nd largest volcanic peak in the US, Mt Shasta. This mountain towers 14,500ft above sea level. Thought the weather forecast predicted rain and mild winds. Lucky for us we did not encounter rain. The mountain was very dry. Unlucky for us the winds were not mild. The winds must have been blowing about 80-90 mph gusts. We struggled and fought our way to Lake Helen, the altitude definitely made it much harder. When we got to camp site it was getting dark and we decided to just set up camp, cook and head to bed. Everything went well, the winds died down, and the weather was fair. At 12 am things changed completely. The winds started up again. The tent that we brought wasn't designed for the high winds and collapsed while we attempted to sleep. When faintest bit of light peak over the mountain in the morning we got up and got ready to head for the summit. However, I noticed that I was missing something. Sometime during the night my pack got blown off the mountain. This is when we decided to retreat. We quickly headed down, with out sleep, with out a pack, and a destroyed tent. Mt Shasta first attempt failed. Its okay.. I'll bback.

On the way back I got a speeding ticket. Yay.. maybe i'll get my license suspended now.

Ensenada


The day after my trip back from northern california, Me and Hiroko headed out to Ensendda on a cruise. This trip was a great get away for me and Hiroko. We have been wanting to get away together, but it was hard because she had work during the week days. At first I wanted to drive to mexico, but Hiroko has never been on a cruise, so we took the cruise. Tons of food too eat shows to watch. We had such a good time. The short weekend felt much longer than 3 days. It was nice because we were able to just relax. We spent our time on the ship waking up late and eating lots and sleeping late. Late night "R" rate comedy shows caused us to laugh and giggle. In mexico we enjoyed the La Bufadora and the wineries around. The dinner table we sat at was very diverse. We enjoyed meeting our dinner buddies. India, japan, brazil, US and taiwan were all represented at the table. We arrived back in Long Beach Monday morning with a whole day to relax. Great Week.


Parrot

Though this isn't exactly part of the adventure it is part of my life story. This Parrot randomly flew in to our house. Now its our pet. Its really chill.. We haven't named it yet, but we might be calling it Pio. It is very smart and it knows how to say hello. It love hiroko and my mom, so sometimes it get jealous of me, my bro and dad and attacks us. Cute bird. Look how happy hiroko looks. Hiroko loves animals.. I love hiroko.

Click on the picture to see all the picture.

Me and Hiroko have been scoping out SLRs for a while now. We often feel very limited to our point and shoot. Its too dark, its to light, we can't adjust this and that. So now that we are done with wedding budgeting we decided to help ourselves to a digital SLR. Me and Hiroko have been both wanting to get into photography. When she is climbing I can take pictures and vise versa. This way we can both be the subject and photographer. Though hiroko has no previous knowledge of photography she is very excited to learn. I'm excited to teach as well as learn with her. After much selection and thought, for the past half year, we decided to go Canon. We didn't have any camera equipment so we decided to get the whole "shibang".

This is our set up
Body: Canon XSi
Lens: Canon 17-40mm f/4 L
Tamron 28-75mm 2.8 SP XR Di (thanks to Michael Lee)
Flash: Speedlite 430x
Case: Pelican Soft Case
Lowepro Topload 65 AW

Here are some test pictures

Grandma


Hiroko's Wedding Dress

Our wedding was great. The planning and work came together so smooth. If you weren't there it was too hard to describe, if you were there thanks for coming. I hoped it was fun for you as it was for me. It was great to share my commitment with all my friends and family. Hiroko was so beautiful today. One of the best things about this weekend other than the wedding is that we were able to hang out with our close friends and family. Hiroko's family and friends traveled half way around the globe to be here. I'm amazed at the dedicated friends that she has. Hiroko just has the ability to make people around her love her. I also discovered how many good friends I have this weekend. With out friends like Josh Rodgers, Erich Chen, Michael Lee, and Diana Reyes this wedding would not have worked. For those readding .. Josh is a great wedding designer, Erich Chen and Michael Lee are excellent photographers and Diana is the most awesome planner. She will get things done and right.

Click on Picture to See Engagement Photo and Wedding Photo


Photo By: Michael Lee


Kissing in the bounce house. Photo by: Erich Chen