Dispatches: The Mailman who Made Mail Fun is Leaving Santa Cruz

He calls himself "your mail dude," and for a decade Abe Feran-Hickman RedCloud has been a living picture postcard for the wonderful quirkiness of Santa Cruz as he delivers mail downtown pushing a cart decorated for each holiday.

"I hate to leave," he said Thursday, four days before shoving off for Portland, OR after 25 years in Santa Cruz. "If it were just me and my wife, we could have done it, but with two kids, we just can't afford to stay here."

Born in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, RedCloud, 35, moved to Santa Cruz when he was 10. He went to both Harbor and Soquel high schools.

He said it would cost half as much to live in Oregon. He pays $1,500 rent here for a two-bedroom house and will pay $1,100 for a three-bedroom home in Oregon, or as little as $800 for two bedrooms. He and his wife Kasi have a 3-year-old boy, Owen, and a 1-year-old, Athena.

People around town were sad to hear that he was moving. Some read it in an ad he took out saying goodbye in the Santa Cruz Weekly newspaper.

"Sometimes he looked so serious but then you'd talk to him and he'd always make you smile," said Guinevere Krebs, a supervisor at the , who made him a going away present – a cardboard mailbox filled with three pairs of socks, including one with surfers on them to remind him of home.

Krebs said RedCloud was always sharing stories in his stop offs to pick up and deliver mail. He also collected for a number of charities.

"It's so sad," she said. "He was the nicest mailman I've ever met."

Abe wrote a farewell to Santa Cruz that was printed in the Weekly:

"I will miss the beautiful City! Thank you to everyone for making my life happy and rewarding. I will miss being able to walk down Pacific Ave. in the beautiful Santa Cruz weather, putting a smile on people's faces when they see the cart. I even have people that visit Santa Cruz looking for the decorated cart downtown."

He said he hopes to keep the decorating tradition going in Portland. He started here with only Halloween and Christmas, but people asked for more, so he does President's Day, Fourth of July, Veteran's Day, Memorial Day, Halloween and Easter.

Because he talked to so many people every day, he set a goal of doing bicycle rides for charity and getting sponsors.

"My mission was to do 10 bike rides for charity and raise as much money as I could," he said. "I've ridden from San Francisco to L.A. twice and raised $5,000 each time. All together, I think I raised around $20,000 over the past 10 years. I guess I could say like with everything, I did it to the best I could."