Rain, rain, rain and ...

Waking up this morning (still in Seattle) was pretty awkward since paramedics and police officers were everywhere. People were gossiping about what happened, with stories going from murder to suicide to instant death. While checking out of the hostel I eavesdropped on some paramedics talking and found out the coroner was on its way, but I'm still not sure what exactly happened. Most likely it was caused by a drug overdose, which led to suffocation and ultimately death.

I still had some money left and decided to take some busses since hitchhiking in town is really hard. I ended up in Olympia with exactly 30 cents left in my pocket. Next stop on my route was Aberdeen and I was preparing to hitchhike when a lady suddenly gave me 2 dollars to take the bus there :-) In the meantime, it had started raining non stop which made the trip far less fun.

When the bus finally arrived in Aberdeen, it was already pitch dark but I started going to Raymond anyway. After a few miles, I was out of Aberdeen and found myself in the middle of nowhere.
No lights, no cars, no people.. Just me, my flashlight, the pouring rain and highway 101. After an hour or so, a sign told me there was still 20 miles (32KM) left to the next village and my courage dropped to a new low. There were many trees along the highway which were perfect to setup my hammock tent, but I could never actually find a way to access them.
After a while, I got really desperate and took a leap into the tall grass between the road and the trees, which filled my shoes with water instantly. Just walked into a small mountain river, great!
Realizing this wouldn't work, I started going back to Aberdeen to spend the night. Luckily, a car came by and the guy was friendly enough to pick me up and bring me back into town.

Back in Aberdeen and truly soaked, I looked for a place to setup the tent. There were some great trees on someones property so I decided to ask the owners if I could camp out there.
There were actually 3 couples living in the house, who all went to the same college in Aberdeen and were about 20 years old. One of the guys invited me in and offered me a place on the couch!
(after asking me if I wasn't an axe murderer - with me responding that I forgot my axe at home that day :-) )
I put my shoes on the stove, warmed myself up, curled into my sleeping bag and enjoyed the comfort of being inside on a rainy day.