Friend P.K. said to me some time ago that the PNW felt like a national park. Trees everywhere, parks every third block, untouched water bodies, birds and bushes, and grass covering every piece of land. It feels like I live inside a cabin in the middle of a nice forest, she told me.
I've mulled over the comment over the past weeks, and that's a pretty great assessment of the situation. California is dry and dusty, it's a desert wasteland. The east coast is frozen and gloomy. The other places are far too hot to be good. But the PNW gets a lot of rain, is in the right range for trees to thrive, flowers to bloom and plans to really cover everything. And the culture here appreciates that. So suburbs are covered in a canopy of trees, the cities have trees on the sidewalks, parks every couple of blocks, and the parks are urban forests themselves.
With all the opportunities to go hike in the mountains, raft in the rivers, climb the peaks, explore the forests and dare I say do controlled hunting, this area of the country is as close to living inside a national park as it guests. The culture here appears to be quite connected to the surroundings, more so than any other urban region except perhaps Colorado. And people are proud about their trees and the obsession. It's honest, it's endearing.
It's all so lovely.
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