I never really blog about my personal experiences on the Internet, unless it’s on my personal Facebook wall for all (whom I choose) to see. However, lately I have had some amazing adventures with my best friend and boss, Ajia Mae Moon, travelling this past summer to get highly medicated, enjoy pot recreationally, and speak at high events such as Seattle, Washington’s 24th Annual Hempfest and the 5th annual Prairie Medicinal Harvest Cup (PMHC) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

Hempfest: Seattle, WA

This year’s Seattle Hempfest was my first trip to include legal recreational weed, my first trip to Washington, and it also paved the way for a few cool “beside myself” moments, such as meeting Tommy Chong and being able to speak on stage with some amazing female activists — like Ajia, Adela, and Rebecca Ambrose — about my personal life-experiences with cannabis.

Our arrival in Washington was dimmed when our car learned that our other mates were denied entry at the U.S. Border because they were recognized as cannabis activists. The group of three were held for seven hours at the Blaine crossing. And Tracy Curley, Weed Woman Canada, was one of the unfortunates — for advocates, even travel to legal marijuana events can sometimes be impossible!

After realizing that the others weren’t going to make it through, our group — Ajia, CannaCure, Rebecca Ambrose, and I — sought out our first recreational weed store and did some serious canna-shopping.

My goodness! What a heaven of awesomeness … like, WOW! Everything from edibles, elixirs, capsules, skin and hair products to bath-bombs, blunts and pre-rolled filtered joints, shatter flavour-bombs for ecigs, regular shatter, wax, budder, and even pre-rolled $100.00 cannons. The recreational weed stores also carry organic sections too. And variety? Oh yes, 50-75 varieties of cannabis strains easily.

The pot shops in Washington have everything you could imagine. The hotels even carry tour maps of pot shops!

We purchased a few 5-packs of pre-rolled Blueberry joints, which mimic mini cigarette packages with warning labels for that real naughty feel! The quality of the flowers was all amazing, and the budtenders were top-notch, educated, and even knew the growers.

Now you are probably wondering, “What about prices?” Well honestly, not cheap. Prices in USD range from $12–$20/gram for flowers to $60–$100/gram for shatter. And for food a good example would be the caramels, which were $40.00 for six 60mg THC caramels. Not cheap! So, have spending money if you want to rock like a boss. Or at least bring enough dough to try buying it once to get the legal recreational feel of this limited-chance lifetime experience!

Day one in Seattle rained like a bitch, really hard all-day and all-night, so Ajia and I decided to get tattoos next to the hotel rather than go to the outdoor event.

I had an owl in moonlight, originally designed by illustrator Mark Ingram, inked on my upper back. The owl is from Weed Woman, and is a representation of me, Weed Woman’s protector. Ajia got paw prints, music notes, and a crescent moon on her forearm to symbolize her love of both creatures and music: her spiritual guides. It was just one of the adventures I had on this journey with her, and I loved every moment.

Day two was cloudy but with zero rain, good enough to stroll down the streets of Seattle. As we walked it suddenly reminded me of downtown Vancouver, but happened to uphold its unique feel when we were warned by our budtenders not to toke in public. In fact, it’s illegal to smoke weed in public there, even legalized, as it isn’t yet federally recognized. In Vancouver however, go ahead and light up anywhere, then maybe be asked to put it out.

At the bottom of the hill awaited the white, gated fence of Hempfest, where kiosks and vendors lined up and stretched for miles along the sea wall. It was spectacular! It was there we met up with Adela Falk and Dennis Boisvert and their wonderful friend Victoria Mindiola, who happily shared their kiosk space with us.

Pot smoking was permitted on the rocks by the water. We ran there for our first joint: Ahhhh … finally recreational weed. The scenery was majestic, the people were amazing, and the pot? Well, what can I say, it was phenomenal.

Later in the afternoon, we met Erin Purchase and Brandon Krenzler and they shared with us some amazing dabs he’d made! We got pretty high throughout the day with his tasty treats.

Ajia and I were later invited to speak on stage by Adela: to share our experiences in Canada, our common missions, and to share our passion for cannabis freedom through dialogue and audience engagement. It was amazing to touch the hearts of people who hold the same values and concepts about cannabis. That was a gift in itself. Visiting Seattle will definitely happen again! 

PMHC: Saskatoon, SK

October means Thanksgiving and Halloween to most in Canada, but to growers, medicinal cannabis users, and potheads alike, October also means harvest time for cannabis flowers. Every year, Jeffrey Lundstrom of Skunk Funk Smoker’s Emporium in Saskatoon holds a cannabis medicinal cup — notoriously known as the Prairie Medicinal Harvest Cup (PMHC) — that brings the Canadian cannabis community together under one roof to sample the cured flowers ‘grown with love’ by avid growers.

This year, the fifth annual cup, marked the first where concentrates were present on the testing and tasting menu, which provided dab and hash lovers a warmer sense of welcome. Entry submissions climb every year; a total of eighteen flower strains and six concentrates were featured at this PMHC. 

Day one, with two days to test them all, Ajia and I suddenly found ourselves on a mission! Upon our arrival in “Toon Town”, we met up with fellow cannabis activist and best friend, CannaCure, who flew in shortly after us. The three of us were able to share a large room at the Holiday Inn comfortably, like silly teenagers, where we also merrily rolled our danky flowers.

With all those samples to test I admittedly needed a hand, so I asked CannaCure to help me judge my sticky treats. While he happily obliged for the first half dozen or so, I was then pretty much on my own when he went and vaped samples with Shatterbeard, one of the cannabis movement’s soldiers in Vancouver.

(But I did okay: I finished all of my samples on time and also got my submission in … three hours before deadline! I think I only made it on time because of CannaCure’s help though, to be honest.)

Day two we took a brisk stroll over to O’Brians, where this epic event is held annually, and we lit up samples along the way to try.

Arriving inside, we looked over where vendors and tables were set up, as well as the glassblowing torches. Oh yes that’s right, Jeff does it right and has his glass pack trio making their creations live every year. And those handsomely gifted gents would be Ryan Shine Pipes, Patrick Redbeard Vrolyk, and Gibson (James) Glass.

This year, Cannabis Culture’s Marc Emery and his beautiful wife Jodie Emery made their first appearance at PMHC, as well as POT.TV’s “Marijuana Man”. This is also where Ajia made her star debut as Weed Woman Australia, and I made mine as her “Owl”.

Ajia had recently had an article written about her, by John Vergados of SKUNK Magazine, and brought copies to sign and give away to her new-found fans.

During the course of the event, Ajia and I both had the opportunity to take the stage, together and individually, alongside several well-respected activists in the Canadian cannabis community, like motivational speaker Dana Larsen of Sensible BC — the author of Green Buds and Hash, an adult parody book in the likeness of Dr. Seuss’ Green Eggs and Ham.  

Many smiling faces continuously arrived, new ones and familiar, meshing freely among the clouds of the thick billowy haze, bonding and reuniting in happiness. The ambiance was perfect for a toker’s paradise.

Day three wound down with the awards for the best flowers and concentrates as well as a new addition to this year’s cup: the Activist Achievement Award. This amazing award was presented to Jerry Martin of Martin Medicinal Services. Jerry has been an altruistic addition to the cannabis family, and without his services some people would have suffered gravely. We are grateful to have Jerry in our canna-family, and also to him for our passes to the PMHC.

And on my own personal note, I want to thank Ajia Mae Moon for being the best friend a person could have, and thank her for these adventures. I certainly look forward to a hundred more!