The Big Secret Revealed!

Remember what I was super excited about a few posts back??? Well, we vacated and now we're back and I can tell you all about it since it's no longer a surprise for my family.

(For those of you who don't know...our summer vacation tradition is that I plan it all out each year and no one else in the family has any idea where we're going nor what we're doing.)

Well, this year, we went to...

We climbed into the car Saturday afternoon and I told Jeff to drive to the airport. I'm so mean! They of course all thought that we were going to be getting on a plane. Wrong! We rented a car. And what a car it was!

This Mercury Mariner is likely the nicest car we will ever spend a whole week in. However, it was not the car I wanted since we would be driving 1600 miles and it only got 17 miles per gallon!!! Two months in advance I had reserved a car that got 33 mpg, but that car wasn't available. (What are reservations for exactly? Hmm?) So the car company gave us a free upgrade. Ha! Free my foot!

Alas, what could we do? I signed on the dotted line and we were on our way. It was a very nice automobile, complete with cruise control (which Jeff praised a number of times over the course of the trip) and leather seats (which sure came in handy when someone-who-shall-remain- nameless accidentally dumped a whole cooler full of water onto my seat).

Saturday was spent simply driving. I warned them all that we wouldn't be having any fun whatsoever until Sunday.

Sunday, we drove the Avenue of the Giants which is absolutely beautiful. We spent that night in Eureka.

Monday morning we left for Crescent City. On our way, we stopped at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. That is one of the loveliest places I've ever had the joy of walking through. I know it sounds ridiculous, but that area makes Yosemite look positively plain. The lush foliage is everywhere and it is breathtaking. I kept expecting to see a group of fairies fly out of the ferns or down from the mossy tree limbs above. It honestly didn't seem real. The pictures don't do it justice.


We spotted nine banana slugs on our hiking trail.These delightfully slimy looking creatures could be seen inching across the trail or curled up on fern leaves.


We continued on to Crescent City. There's an aquarium there with eels, fish, sea lions and a shark petting pool. Doesn't the little white seal look like she's smiling?


There's also a wonderful beach on which the surf has deposited huge piles of little pebbles. We plopped ourselves down and sifted through, looking for agates. We all found some and other beautiful stones besides.


It was a rather chilly day but we persevered for at least an hour, sifting and searching. It was kind of like sitting in a huge ball-pit (you know like the ball-pits that kids sink into at the play yards at Mc Donald's) and rather therapeutic. It was so exciting when you actually spotted an agate. (They're the somewhat transparent ones with the swirly-feathery patterns in them.)

On Tuesday morning we headed for Oregon. The beauty never stopped.


We toured the Oregon Caves and found what looked like alien spawn deep within the earth.



We ended up in Ashland where we saw "A Comedy of Errors" at the yearly Shakespeare Festival. It had a Wild West theme. Originally we had tickets to see "A Mid-Summer Night's Dream" but a lady at the box office told me it was a rather risque version so I prudently switched the tickets out for the more innocuous play. The theater was packed out and the company did a great job of presenting the comedy...even the kids enjoyed it.

We spent a second day in Ashland, wanting to take a break from the long drives. It's such a beautiful town. The kids found a snake as we strolled through Lithia Park. Here's Tobias and his new-found friend:


Thursday, we drove up to Crater Lake. There was still a grip of snow on the ground and unfortunately, the northern entrance was going to be opening the next day. (I had planned on exiting that way to get to Eugene, so that added another 45 minutes to our drive.)

By late afternoon, we were in Eugene, getting lost amongst all of the one-way streets with which Oregon is plagued. Then, one of the nicest of my planned surprises took place. We got to see our friends Shawn and Erin. They are a couple of incredibly talented people who are also fun to hang out with. If you want to hear their very original and awesome music, check them out on Myspace under the band name "Moher". Here they are with their dog, Guinness:



Ever seen a nutria? Here's one now:



Apparently they are "wannabe-beavers" and they roam free in public parks in Eugene. They're cuter than opossums!

Friday, we continued north on the I-5. Near Salem we took a side road to one of my newly declared favorite places on earth--Silver Falls State Park. It was quite a convoluted drive to get there but so worth it. We took about a four mile hike through more of that gorgeous greenery, but we had the added bonus of multiple waterfalls. It was nearly a perfect afternoon. The shady hike wasn't too rough and around nearly every corner was the reward of a stunning sight such as...



Can you see the people walking in the horizontal crevice behind the waterfall? That's how huge the fall is.

The hike was a bit muddy as you can see:



We barely found our way back to the 5 and continued on to Portland where we got stuck in rush hour traffic. (I guess arriving around 5 pm in a major city on a Friday wasn't the best plan.)

Call me asinine, but knowing that we were so close to a whole other state gave me the idea to plan our dinner that night for a restaurant in Washington just so we could say we went there. So, we hopped over the Columbia and feasted.



The next morning we set out to find Portlandia--an amazing copper statue that I read about online and wanted to see with my own eyes. She's really huge, kneeling on top of a building and reaching over the side.



After that, we reveled in the final excursion of our trip.We took a jet boat tour 20 miles up the Willamette to Willamette Falls in Oregon City.




Our boat's pilot took great joy in drenching us all with his 360 turns and sudden veers.



It was fun and beautiful, even a bit educational (shh, don't tell the kids.)

When it was all over, we made our way to Portland's airport, returned our rental and flew home where our own car was waiting for us. This was Delaney's first flight ever and she was quite excited about it.


When it was all over, we asked her how she liked it.

"Well, I was expecting it to be more like a roller coaster," she said.

(Thank God it wasn't!)

All in all, this was a fabulous trip and I recommend that anyone who has never been to Northern California and Oregon should go there as soon as possible. The beauty is astonishing. Jeff and I would actually like to move there though the practicality of that is quite questionable. We can dream, can't we?