Drinking pomegranate green tea, with my eyes fixated on this glowing research tool, I'm needing to stop checking out websites. For the past 6 hours, I've been fine tuning the contact information and destinations that we're going to be documenting along our route, especially in Oregon, as it seems there is so much to choose from. Many towns, most notably Portland, but her smaller friends of Eugene, C0rvallis, Bend, Ashland, stand out in many ways in terms of how long they have been implementing sustainable practices for their communities.

• Portland and Eugene: Named greenest cities. Not a surprise, when Portland was the first city to adopt a strategy to cut it's emissions, over 15years ago when Co2 and ecofootprint weren't even heard of. And Eugene, well, if I had to come up with terms of what "green" could mean, I'd say one with walkable/bikable communities, community gardens, parks, eco designs having LEED certification, sustainable forums at all levels, especially at the city level, and taking a look at the sites, there seems to be reason why they are in the top ten. http://www.thegreenguide.com/doc/113/top10cities
  

• Corvallis: has one of the highest percentages of people who use bikes in the US. Not up to Groningen, Netherlands, but hey, biking is catching on, and not only that but popular!

• Pringle Creek Community, Salem: a development where eco-urban design reigned in its planning and final implementation, where it boasts as one of the most sustainable communities in the US. We'll see about that when we get there. Nonetheless... http://www.pringlecreek.com/explore.htm
  

• Bend is all about utilizing green power, giving consumer the choice of 100% renewable energy in the form of wind, solar, biomass, geothermal. To date, over 10% of the population is using renewable energy, as part of the Bend Blue Sky Community Challenge. http://www.pacificpower.net/Article/Article78162.html
  

What has been informative is that at all levels, individual, business, school, city and county governments, and even state governments are pushing us to think and take action that makes economical, environmental, and to me, common sense.
....so for the next couple of hours, I'll see what my old friend of California has to offer.