Time to move on

It is Summer here in America. You can tell it is Summer not by the weather, well not in San Francisco anyway where the winds are chilled and the temperature struggles to reach over 24, but by the sudden huge influx of people in the city and the subsequent price rises of the hostels.

Which for a budget conscious backpacker these are of course not ideal situations. Sigh.

But regardless of finance or population, I just kind of have this strong feeling that now is the right time to leave San Francisco and continue on. I can never quite explain these impulses, this almost psychic link where I just seem to know things, but they are always right thus are not to be ignored.

Besides, Vincent is long gone, Mardy left the other day, and Isabel came back for a few days which was awesome (and a strong reason why I decided to hang around in this city longer than I intended too also) but even she has left for home also, leaving me with no great friends here in the city anymore (which also translates into 'no compeling reason to stay here either').

I truly loved this city from the moment I first arrived, late at night with my parents as we drove over the Bay Bridge after our two day road trip from Las Vegas. I had a great feeling about this place and it truly delivered above and beyond my grandest hopes, allowing me to have some of the best times on this entire trip.

There was the hanging out with Andy in my first few days, then of course the awesome week with Vincent, the amazingly fun hostel pub crawls, becoming friends with Isabel, the Napa Valley wine tour day, living with Mardy on Treasure Island, getting a job as a co-host at the hostel pub crawls, and the hundreds of other little unblogged occurrences that all made this place just so memorable.

But, alas, it is time to leave. I told my 'boss' (from my very loosely based 'hostel pub crawl co-host' job I got the other week) that I was to be leaving, which she was cool with as she knew I was to be on the move soon anyway, and... yep, besides that there wasn't any other loose ends that needed tieing whatsoever.

The true beauty of this trip is the freedom it allows me to flow completely uninhibited, with no one to check in with or anything holding me down.

So where to next? Well during the nearly being homeless for a night or two saga the other week I met the awesome couple James and Millie who told me about a website called HelpX.net where farms, families, hostels or whatever are seeking helpers in exchange for food and accommodation. Sounds pretty cool!

After hours upon hours narrowing down my choices I finally just dove right in and emailed two potential places; one a family about 2 hours East of San Francisco in a mountain town who needs help around their house, whilst the other was a Bed and Breakfast about 4 hours North-West of San Francisco in a small coastal town.

Only the Bed and Breakfast replied (she was highly interested in my 'website building skills' which I may or may not have grossly slightly exaggerated my truthful skill level in my application... let's hope it doesn't come back to bite me!) so I guess come Monday I will be taking the two buses, 7 hour in total commute to a little coastal town in North California called Fort Bragg!

I have absolutely no idea what to expect, if it will even work out, or how long I am to be there. Yikes.

I originally came to America with the sole intention of staying in New York City for as long as I could, with Los Angeles intending to be a one-week max stop over simply to gather myself. You could say things haven't quite gone to plan, ha.