Leaving the Vandenberghe residence in the middle of the morning, on I charged to Eugene. I’d written previously to Dwight Coon, the mayor of Junction City, which I’d be passing on my way to Eugene. He told me he’d like to stop and walk a few miles with me once he left work, and just after shortly after I made it past Junction City’s mile-long business strip, he found me on the side of the highway, and we walked a mile together. I love seeing and learning about the human side of all of our public figures. Dwight talked to me about everyday life, work, family, etc– nothing for the cameras, just one-person-to-another, in-depth conversation.

I was still getting used to the heavy backpack, the hard way–it felt like carrying a bag of bricks around. Just over a mile out from the first retail outpost of greater Eugene, a city of about 100,000, a pretty woman pulled off the side of the highway and waved at me from across some lanes of traffic. I stepped over to say hello to this sweet young lady, and Mrs. Kourtni Rader & I have since become friends! Like the Vandenberghe Family, Kourtni had also read of my story in the local Corvallis newspaper. She offered to treat me to dinner, which I quickly accepted. She pointed to a sub sandwich shop, just over a mile down the road, and we met there. As was the case with the Vandenberghe’s the day before, I quickly trusted her enough to leave my heavy-as-bricks backpack with her. We sat down and chatted for a while across a table at the sandwich shop. At the time, Kourtni worked for a local adoption agency which specialized in adopting children from Korea. Kourtni herself was one of these children, having come to America from Korea at an early age. Fascinating to hear that she now worked for Holt, the very agency which administered her adoption. She was adamant about me visiting and being given a tour of Holt the following day. We exchanged phone numbers, and after spending a night at Maikey’s, I was looking forward to visiting Kourtni & Holt the following day.

Later in the evening, I finished hobbling my way across a busy, narrow highway bridge into Eugene. Maikey, the Couchsurfing.org host who told me on line that he’d like to host me, wasn’t calling me, and it was getting late. I wasn’t sure where I might be staying for the night, and fortunately, it appeared I would have a potential backup option with other CSers if I didn’t hear from Maikey. Luckily, Maikey did call at the last minute, and since he lived much closer to my current location, I proceeded straight to his mile-away home. An immigrant from Venezuela, Maikey works in the medical field, and spends his spare time running marathons, climbing mountains, and biking across frozen Siberian lakes, etc. He has many fascinating stories to share. Before parting for bed for the night, he gave me a roll of medical/surgical tape for my blisters, to replace the duct tape that I’d been using. His gift ended up being SUPER useful to me across the many miles ahead! More great places, more great people, and on to another good night’s rest…