We had been planning to go to Oregon for our one year anniversary trip since we got back from our honeymoon. Things were finally set in place at the end/middle of May (slight procrastination) and June was flying by. It was finally coming! Originally we planned to fly out there and rent a car to get around. As it turns out, plane tickets are expensive and renting a car even more expensive since neither of us is 25 years of age. So we planned on a two week long road trip out to the west coast and around the state of Oregon.
The week leading up to the leaving day was hectic. We had never gone camping before with our own supplies so many shopping trips were to be had. Most of the shopping was done by Tuesday, while Wednesday and Thursday were spent overtaking the second bedroom as a packing center. Finally everything was packed and we were ready to leave the next morning.
Friday, June 28th
Location: driving across Iowa and Nebraska (arrived at 5:30 pm)
Books listened to: started Heat Wave by Richard Castle
Stayed at: Nathan and Emily's house, Kimball, NE
Highlights: visiting with Nate and Emily
Lowlights: the hills of western Iowa, wind, the almost constant (very slight) uphill of Nebraska and discovering what our gas mileage was actually going to be
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| All ready to leave (finally!) |
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| Most of what Nebraska looks like |
Saturday, June 29th
Location: driving across Wyoming, Northern Utah, most of Nevada (arrived at 10 pm)
Books listened to: finished Heat Wave by Richard Castle
Stayed at: Super 8, Winnemuncca, NV
Highlights: seeing two police people on the side of the highway in WY with their guns pulled someone in another car, driving across Northern NV during sunset
Lowlights: spending 12 hours in the car and taking forever to get to Winnemuncca, driving across the very hot and flat salt flats passed Salt Lake City, UT
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| pit stop in Wyoming |
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| the salt flats |
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| Some of the smaller (if you could call them) mountains |
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| sunset in Nevada |
Sunday, June 30th
Location: driving across Southern Oregon and finally reaching our destination (arrived at 5 pm)
Books listened to: Heat Rises by Richard Castle
Stayed at: Millcreek Campgrounds in the middle of the Redwood National Forest, Cresecnt City, CA
Highlights: finally arriving at the coast and seeing the redwoods and just the forest and Pacific Ocean for the first time.
Lowlights: being on the third day of driving, not much else
Dinner: Pizza pudgy pies
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| We made it! |
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| an ocean view near our campsite |
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| a redwood stump |
Monday, July 1st
Location: stayed at Millcreek Campgrounds, Redwood National Forest
Weather: lower 70s and sunny
Activities: hiking down Damnation Creek Trail through the forest down to the ocean (absolutely gorgeous), driving more on Hwy 101 along the coast, surprisingly there were little bugs
Hiking: 4.2 miles (1000 ft elevation change)
Dinner: Hobo dinners
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| first hike of the trip |
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| everything was just so big |
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| the Pacific! |
Tuesday, July 2nd
Location: drove from the redwoods to Crater Lake National Park, Oregon (arrived at 2 pm)
Stayed at: Mazama Campground in Crater Lake National Park
Activities: drove around the rim of the lake, hiked down and swam in the freezing cold water, watched most of the sunset before giving up due to the large number of mosquitos eating us alive
Hiking: 2.2 miles (700 ft elevation change)
Dinner: more pizza pudgy pies
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| destination #2 |
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| swimming in the very cold water |
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| the lake is fed only by rain and snowfall |
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| sunset (before the mosquitoes attacked) |
Wednesday, July 3rd
Location: stayed at Mazama Campground, Crater Lake National Park
Weather: 80s and sunny
Activities: started driving around the rim again, stopped at some of the small waterfalls, hiked up Mt. Scott (the tallest mountain in the park) and saw an amazing view of the lake and surrounding mountains, met some people from MI on the way down and had a nice conversation with them, continued around the rim to stop and take some pictures, hiked up to Watchman’s lookout on the other side of the lake, ended at Rim Village to check out the gift store and sit some more on the edge of the lake, arrived at the campground to sit and relax after a long day of hiking
Hiking: 5 miles (1200 ft elevation change) + 1.6 miles (700 ft elevation change)
Dinner: burgers
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| ready, set, go! |
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| we climbed to the top of this peak |
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| there was still a lot of snow on the ground |
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| only a glimpse of the beauty of the mountains |
Thursday, July 4th
Location: drove from Crater Lake National Park to Newport, OR along the coast on Hwy 101 (arrived at 4 pm)
Books listened to: started The Racketeer by John Grisham
Stayed at: Oceanside at Little Creek Cove, Newport, OR
Activities: we biked across town to grab a bite to eat, walked along the bay front and were going to stick around for the fireworks, decided to bike back before it got dark and walked along the beach in hopes of catching the fireworks from there (didn’t turn out as planned)
Biking: 6 miles
Dinner: Noodles Café (an Asian meal on the 4th of July)
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| an oceanview pit stop |
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| walking along the beach |
Friday, July 5th
Location: Newport, OR
Weather: 60s, sunny and windy
Activities: Relaxed in the morning, read some books, went to Dispicable Me 2 for an afternoon showing, walked into town along the beach after the movie and ended up across the bay to eat at Rogue’s Brewery and shared a banana split at an ice cream shop along Nye Beach before walking back home along the beach
Walked: 7ish miles
Dinner: Rogue’s Brewery and a Banana split :)
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| time on the beach |
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| not too many of these, actually |
Saturday, July 6th (Our Anniversary)
Location: Newport, OR
Weather: 60s, windy, partly cloudy
Activities: we decided that since it was our anniversary it would be a day of relaxing and minimal walking, spent most of the day reading on the porch facing the ocean, drove into town to eat at Nana’s so Tony could taste their Reuben sandwich (had really good reviews), came back and watched some Arrested Development on Netflix
Walked: nowhere!!
Dinner: Nana’s Irish Kitchen
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| enjoying a nice cup of coffee |
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| spent most of my time here |
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| Dinner date |
Sunday, July 7th
Location: Newport, OR
Weather: 60s, windy, mostly cloudy
Activites: traveled to the Yaquina Park which is home to a lighthouse, saw some harbor seals and beautiful views of the ocean from the cliffs, walked along some of the trails, did a load of laundry at the laundromat, relaxed the rest of day, made a fully loaded pizza for dinner and ended the night with a fire on the beach (not necessarily a good idea due to all the wind)
Walked: 2 miles max
Dinner: homemade pizza
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| fun! fun! fun! |
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| tending to the fire |
Monday, July 8th
Location: drove from Newport to Portland, OR (arrived at 3 pm)
Books listened to: continued The Racketeer by John Grisham
Stayed at: AAE Downtown Value Inn in Portland (very cheap)
Activities: walked around downtown along the Williamette river up to the Pearl District and walked through the streets on the way back, found a restaurant to eat dinner and walked back to the motel room
Walked: 4 miles
Dinner: Deschutes Brewery (Tony’s new favorite microbrewery and he discovered a life-changing beer)
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| a fountain in Portland (apparently you can swim in it) |
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| Tony and his life changing beer |
Tuesday, July 9th
Location: Portland, OR
Weather: 80s and sunny
Activities: woke up, walked to the train station to take the train to Washington Park/Portland Zoo, took the bus to the Japanese Garden and the Rose Garden (Tony loves roses), walked back to the zoo to continue on something called the 4T trail (train, trail, tram, trolley), walked through the park and some of the city to the Health and Sciences University (trail portion), took the tram from the top of the hill to the bottom and boarded the streetcar to go home, made a pit stop at the motel, changed and went out to dinner, came back after dinner and relaxed
Walked: 6+ miles (500 some ft elevation change)
Dinner: Mother’s Bistro (least favorite place)
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| Japanese gardens |
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| Rose gardens |
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| view of Portland from the top of the tram |
Wednesday, July 10th
Location: left early to drive across Northern Oregon, through Idaho and arrive in Salt Lake City, UT (arrived at 10 pm)
Books listened to: finished The Racketeer by John Grisham (very good book)
Stayed at: Jenny and Evan’s in Salt Lake City, UT
Highlights: stopping at some of the waterfalls along the Columbia River Gorge, seeing Jenny and Evan for the first time in about a year
Lowlights: being in the car again for 12+ hours
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| a glimpse of the river gorge |
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| some of the falls we stopped at |
Thursday, July 11th
Location: Salt Lake City, UT
Weather: high 80s and mostly sunny
Activities: I went with Jenny to her workout class (deadly) while Tony read at their place, came back to eat lunch and spent the afternoon downtown SLC walking around Temple Square and the shopping in the mall, ended with dinner at a Mediterranean place and a movie
Dinner: Layla's
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| Utah! |
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| the stereotypical Mormon wedding photo |
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| the creek in the middle of the mall downtown SLC |
Friday, July 12th
Location: left Salt Lake City early and drove through the rest of Utah, Wyoming and most of the way through Nebraska (arrived at 9:30 pm)
Books listened to: made it most of the way through Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame?
Stayed at: Motel 6 in Grand Island, NE
Highlights: the wind was mostly at our backs, being fairly close to home
Lowlights: continuing the drive home
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| goodbye mountains |
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| Tony's favorite job |
Saturday, July 13th
Location: finished the trip through Nebraska and across Iowa to home :) (arrived 2 pm)
Books listened to: Merry Christmas, Alex Cross by James Patterson
Stayed at: HOME!!
Highlights: arriving at home so early in the afternoon and being able to unpack with enough time to still watch Hercules and eat popcorn before bed
Lowlights: remembering what humidity was like
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| a slight representation of how dirty the car was |
Three words to describe our trip: beautiful, enjoyable and relaxing. In short,
IT WAS AWESOME!
