Trip

Here are the words to go with the pics. I ran out of time last night after I posted all this pics. I was copying a ton of stuff for Amber while I posted. So anyways-
This is Mount Hood coming into Portland. Very pretty mountain

We stopped at Multnomah Falls which is just before Portland. It is a fantastic place to stop after nearly 6 hours on the road. We walked up to the bridge to see the falls up closer. It is a beautiful waterfall.

On the other side of Portland we found this little diversion for Lee Joe. He found a happy place. He just got out with the girls and looked in that big window and at the planes in front.


We stopped at Depoe Bay and got the best whale spotting. So cool! The whales we saw this time were much closer and easy to spot. It was just difficult to get the digital camera to take the pictures fast enough. But we saw it come up many times. It was awesome. That was the first little diversion once we hit the coast on Friday.


We stopped at a Science Center in Newport. They have these "tide pool" things where the kids can touch everything. The center is a donation only place so it is almost free. 10 dollars for all of us. Can't beat that kind of deal.

Kylee is touching the octopus. Out of all the aquariums we have been to the past few years this is the only place I have ever seen where you get a great view of an octopus and have an opprotuniity to touch it if it is awake and active. The other picture is in one of the tanks there.

We drove a little farther down and the kids were itching to get near the water. It was very close to low tide and Lee Joe took them up some rocks and this is what they found. Real ocean tide pool.

We drove as far South as a town called Bandon. It was too late to find a camp ground and it was acting like rain. Lee Joe took the loop in that town that went by the ocean and we found this motel. It is the cutest nicest and best night sleep I have ever had in a Motel. The first picture is the view out our room. The 2nd is the room the girls stayed in. They had a princess room that the little lasy that owns the place fixed up her self and it was the cutest room.

We knew that low tide was at 6am that morning. So Lee Joe and the girls got up early and took the walk down to the beach from the Motel. We have never found tide pools like these before.

Hands on the sea stars

Sea Anemones and WOW look at all those Sea stars. Shh-I was still in bed.

We drove all day down to the red woods and we were looking for a camp ground that wasn't full and wasn't a dump. But we had to take this diversion to drive through the tree.

This is the potty stop in a giant log.



We set up camp and this is the next morning. We were able to find our own food. At least a snack. And they are good in cereal too. Blackberries are everywhere there.

We went to the scenic drive and found this area where there was a trail. It was called Big Tree and we are all standing in front of big tree. And then we found Big hollow log, big stand of trees, and the enormous root cluster.



It is place where you feel quite small. But beautiful and breathtaking.

We heard that they filmed a lot of Jurassic park here. I have only seen parts of it on the TV version but this field reminds me of a scene. But that is Lee Joe taking a minute to pick blackberries. We were going to go to this other area where they did film some of the movie but the place was too full people and we weren't allowed to go the rest of the way up.

Back to our hike. I think we were hiking for about 2 miles on this trail. Towards the end we told the little girls to stop running ahead and then we saw elk tracks on the trail. They looked like fresh tracks so we were trying to keep our eyes open. Then Kelsea and Kylee and I were trying to speed walk in first just playing around and laughing at each other where we all of a sudden heard something move in the brush and we looked over to see a bull elk really close. Dead stop and I grabbed both girls next to me and covered Kylee's mouth as she screamed. I said Elk to Lee joe and I wasn't sure what the Elk was going to do so we just stood still Lee Joe and the other 3 girls joined us and I was able to get my camera out because he wasn't going to charge us. I got a picture as he moved away a little and then we saw 2 doe and 2 babies in the trees. We went on our way all jumpy after that but our walk was near the end.

The kids were still so excited about the ocean. We ate lunch in a picnic area. Not really. We sat in the car because it was too windy and cool. But we spent awhile on the beach collecting driftwood and watching pelicans dive in the water. That is a bunch of Pelicans and other sea birds sitting on the beach. We could spot seals here and there but they were never there long enough to get pictures. The waves were just crashing into the beach so the girls couldn't touch the water.


We took a drive up to some bluffs and here is a pretty view.

On our way we tried more beach combing Monday morning. The girls found a few shells that day and they even found some pieces of sea glass. The sea gulls were quite pretty compared to the inland ones. This guy even posed for me.


So yes, we got a flat tire. I have never seen anyone so excited over it in my life. "I can get extra credit in driver's Ed if I change a tire!" So she did. She dressed like that for two days. What a dork.

And there you have it. It seemed like so much longer. We spent hours and hours in the car and the kids were so well behaved considering. The only regret we have is that we couldn't camp closer to the ocean but it was pretty windy where we were so it probably wound not have been as nice as our other trip years ago. And 3 days later I am STILL cleaning up the mess AND doing loads of laundry. But it was all worth it.