My Bloggable Day

Mt Rainier, Washington State

Posted on June 28, 2015 by Bec

On Tuesday we crossed into Washington State and pulled into the rather fancy state capitol building in Olympia to check things out.

Washington’s face was stamped onto everything, including the door handle in the bathroom. Which turned out to be the highlight of our visit, which included a tour we took shortly after I used the bathroom.

Patriotic

We drove on towards Tacoma, which is near where we would be staying with Andrew’s aunt Leslie. We drove over a hill and all of a sudden:

What

Would you get a load of this mountain?!

Absurd

All of a sudden Oregon’s mountains seemed teeny tiny (sorry Oregon) next to mighty Mt Rainier. These cows near Leslie’s house had one of the best views around:

Not that they were bothering to look.

Are we in Switzerland?

Unfortunately the next day our run of spectacular blue skies ended so my photos of Mt Rainier up close aren’t that great.

Dat snow though

We took a hike to Frozen Lake.

Which wasn’t entirely frozen, but that’s ok.

Andrew very kindly bought me some hiking poles from REI to make hiking ~~less awful~~ more comfortable and I was the only person at Mt Rainier under 70 using them. I have no idea why, since they are clearly so cool.

Majestic

We decided to head up a different path to see if we could get a better view of the peak, along the way we saw this sign:

Damn, must have left it in my other handbag…

“Yeah…nah…”

As we were deciding whether to cross, Meagan and LA, sisters from Florida, came side stepping down the snow, clinging to the ice and told us it was one of the scariest things they had ever done. And they are far more experienced hikers than I (although that’s not hard).

So we turned back and chatted to them along the path and swapped details so we could catch up with them in Jacksonville. Excellent! LA also showed me how to take selfies on a GoPro, which I stupidly didn’t know how to do. Life changing.

Us with LA and Meagan (stole this pic from Meagan’s instagram)

We hiked on, back towards where we parked at Sunrise Lodge.

More dirty snow

Check out the colour of that lake!

See?

Sunrise Lodge

A great hike, approximately 8km. I like you Washington.

Quick map update: the exciting news is I’ve had to zoom out to fit it all in because we’ve almost covered one side of the country! The not so exciting news is the Google Maps won’t let me put more than 11 destinations in, so I’ve skimmed over a few places.

Check it out:

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Road Trip, Travel, Washington | 1 Comment

The Oregon Coast

Posted on June 27, 2015 by Bec

After Portland we headed west to the coast for a couple of nights camping at Nehalem Bay State Park. The coastline was ragged and dramatic, then dotted with adorable small towns touting fresh crabs, ice creams and antiques.

The coastal architecture was really great as well, with most houses covered in grey wood shingles.

Pretty

We took a walk along Cape Meares, near the town of Tillamook.

A claw that didn’t make it

Pyramid Rock in the distance

Then we drove around to the Cape Meares State Park.

This is where we saw the world’s most adorable lighthouse, built in 1890:

So stumpy!

We continued our walk up to the Octopus Tree, possibly the lamest tourist attraction ever. I didn’t even take a photo. It’s basically a tree that is meant to look like an upside down octopus, which in my opinion is every tree in the whole damn world.

But how about that scenery!

We left and went to imaginatively named Oceanside to grab a coffee. The cafe was called Brewin’ in the Wind, a name I intend to steal should I ever open a coffee establishment by the sea.

The entire area was bursting with wildflowers

Tillamook is known for its cheese factory and being dairy enthusiasts we braved the crowds to sample the ice cream. Which was a good move, because I think it was the best ice cream I’ve had in my entire life.

Something chocolately and something caramely

Intense creaminess called for fast consumption as fat drops splattered onto the pristine white table in front of us.

The shoreline in Wheeler

An adorable shop in Wheeler

After a busy day we headed back to camp for steak and salad followed by a spectacular sunset (I put a request in for one).

At about 8:30pm (still can’t get over how late the sun sets here!) we found a prime spot on the beach and nestled in.

It was cold

I proceeded to take a couple thousand photos, from which I’ve curated four for your viewing pleasure:

Love a good sunset

The next day we drove to a bigger town called Astoria, our last stop before crossing over into Washington.

I can highly recommend the burger buns from this place:

The coffee wasn’t bad either

We grabbed a couple to have for lunch later on. The entire place smelt of delicious baked goods, it was most tempting.

A nice way to farewell Oregon.

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Oregon, Road Trip, Travel | 5 Comments

Portland, Oregon

Posted on June 24, 2015 by Bec

Portland is a fantastic place to visit if you like to eat food and drink beer and coffee. which we do. In fact, the city reminded me a lot of Melbourne, particularly Fitzroy, Carlton or anywhere north of the river.

We were really fortunate to stay with more lovely relatives of Andrew’s (such a handy guy to travel America with!) and they gave us plenty of tips on must-sees and must-eats around town.

On our first morning we headed to Gravy for breakfast. Andrew, astoundingly, had his largest meal of the trip so far:

Gravy’s Monte Christo; two slices of French toast (made with delicious Jewish challah bread) topped with ham, turkey and swiss cheese. With two eggs and a GIANT hash brown on the side.

And I had the house smoked salmon hash and eggs:

Which was delicious, except for the kale. ‘Never order the kale’ is my new mantra.

After breakfast we were dangerously close to Christmas Day fullness, so we took a walk around the neighbourhood before driving over to Hawthorne.

There we sampled the famous Stump Town Coffee:

And checked out Powell’s Books, a famous independent bookstore in the city.

We bought 7 books from this list of 50 Books to Read Before You Die.

I finished the orange book in the pile (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time) in 24 hours. I just can’t read enough at the moment.

After Powell’s we went to Blue Star Donuts, which is kind of the rival of well known Voodoo Doughnuts.

Lemon poppyseed buttermilk and peanut chocolate ganache

Blue Star was pumping old school Britney Spears and Rihanna, so they immediately got my tick. But not Andrew’s.

That evening we were heading to another of Andrew’s lovely relatives for dinner, so we stopped into Loretta Jean’s pie shop to grab some dessert. Look how adorable it is:

We bought the strawberry rhubarb and it went down a treat.

Continuing along the food theme, we started the next day by checking out the farmers market.

Berries are abundant at the moment in the north west.

There was so much delicious looking produce and food.

Famers markets always make me wish I wasn’t travelling, so I could do my weekly shop and then head home for a feast.

After the famers market we strolled through the mayhem of the Saturday market before joining a veeery long line for a Portland institution.

Almost half an hour later we walked out of the store with this box:

Yep, we waited that long for donuts. Four donuts:

Peanut Oreo, vanilla Oreo, maple bacon and a traditional Voodoo donut.

We paid just over $8 for them, which I found amazingly cheap. But we had to carry the box around for the rest of the day because no one can eat that many donuts in one sitting and expect them to stay down.

So on we walked, to find a brewery for lunch. Which is not at all difficult in Portland.

We ended up at Fat Head Brewery where we shared sliders and wings.

And celery and carrots. Because we’re on a health kick.

Shortly after that I had to cram the remaining voodoo donuts down because it was time to head to the soccer stadium.

Classy

Andrew’s cousin Sue had very kindly organised Timbers tickets for us.

Right in the Timbers Army section, where the most fanatic and dedicated supporters stand. Were we up for the challenge? You bet! Check out this video I took of the national anthem.

Cheers!

Thankfully, we were leant some gear so we fitted right in.

Everyone surrounding us was lovely and imparted their Timbers wisdom on all fronts including when to get discount drinks, where to find the best food and which chant to sing.

There were Timbers Army leaders at the front of each section to keep everyone on the same chant at the same time. They stood with their backs to the game and yelled the entire time, it was impressive! The Army was so organised.

They even had the words written down for novices like us:

And when the Timbers scored this happened:

So awesome!

Also a mascot lumberjack would go and chainsaw a section off a giant log on the edge of the pitch. It was great!

The Timbers won 2-0 and the people sitting in front of us gave us a Timbers Army scarf and two patches to keep as souvenirs. Seriously. Who is that nice?! No one. It was lovely.

We were this close to giving up on the rest of our trip and staying in Portland forever. We’ll be back! Have you been?

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Oregon, Portland, Road Trip, Travel | 9 Comments

Mt Hood

Posted on June 22, 2015 by Bec

Mt Hood teased us, standing in the distance on most of the drive from Bend:

Majestic

Coming from the Bend side (and not the Portland side) there was little signage and no information on hikes or other highlights, which was kind of frustrating.

It took us a while to find our campground, but when we did we found ourselves setting up next to this:

Not bad

After a quick trip to the nearest town for supplies (a scary place called Wamic, the kind where you walk into a bar and everyone stops what they are doing and stares at you) we sat at our picnic table and were joined by some locals:

Doe, a deer

And plenty of geese

As the sun got low we thought we were in for a fairly dull sunset but we took a walk, keeping our eyes peeled for bears, to where we could see the mountain.

I literally turned away for 5 seconds and when I looked back the sky was turning red:

And then this:

Insane. No filters or editing used whatsoever. Oh and that’s Mt Hood poking out.

The next day we set off to find the rangers’ station and get some ideas for a hike. The woman we spoke to was really helpful and suggested a short hike that would give us panoramic views to Mt Hood, the Three Sisters to the south and to other snow capped peaks.

The view from the Rangers’ station

The view from half way up

Standing at the halfway point, by turning in a circle we had the above view as well as this:

The Three Sisters to the south

And this:

Scary

And then we got to the top:

Self timer for the win!

Making it look like I’m sitting on the edge, but the ground is just there

A weird photo series of playing on invisible skateboards/clicking heels:

And some pretty wild flowers, just because

I really loved Mt Hood, it was definitely up there as far as our camping experiences have gone. I would recommend coming from the Portland side though, much more informative!

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Mt Hood, Oregon, Road Trip, Travel | Leave a comment

Oregon: Eugene and Bend

Posted on June 21, 2015 by Bec

After Crater Lake we drove on to Eugene, a fun uni town packed with hippies, activists, potheads, craft breweries, artsy and outdoorsy types. Our time in Eugene (and Bend, come to think of it) was characterised by beautiful nature and junk food.

Starving hungry on the first night in Eugene we headed straight to The Sandwich League, a permanent food van around the corner from our hostel in Whiteaker. Andrew had The Leroy:

*drooling*

A burger topped with bacon, cheese sauce, bbq sauce, fries, cilantro slaw and crispy onions. And I had The Big O:

#foodgasm

Slow roasted beef topped with fries, cheese sauce, bbq sauce, caramelised onion and garlic, fries and crispy onions. After sitting in silence to devour our dinner we headed to the Ninkasi Brewering Company across the street to try some local brews. After that we rounded the corner and went to Sam Bond’s Garage for a few more… you get the gist. After a terrible night’s sleep (I loved our hostel but we were camping in the backyard right next to a freight train line) we got up the next day to hike up Spencer Butte.

You can just see the snow capped Three Sisters in the distance

It was a really beautiful 8km walk (quite steep towards the top) with incredible views out to the Three Sisters mountains. That night we went to a new brew pub that had three food vans to choose from. So new that I can’t remember the name or find their website. Obviously we went with super healthy options.

😉

❤

We moved onto the Pour House (love a themed pun name) and eventually back to our tent by the tracks.

The next day, after amazing Mexican eggs at Cafe Siena, we walked up a different Butte (hehe) to check out a bald eagle nest and to an incredible rose garden, where we read books for a while.

As you can see I really didn’t take a tonne of photos in Eugene, which is strange for me.

On the drive to Bend we got a closer look at the Three Sisters and my, weren’t they pretty?

Good genes no doubt

Someone described Bend to us as a cleaner, more upmarket version of Eugene which I think is a fairly accurate description. In any case it was a sweet town with nice shops, restaurants, cafes and ice cream stores.

We camped nearby at the very picturesque Tumalo State Park. After pitching our tent we wandered down to the Deschutes River to read, occasionally dipping our feet in the bone-chillingly cold water.

I snapped a photo of this bee by the river on my phone, not bad hey?!

The following day, after Google Maps helpfully sent us via an unsealed gravel road, we arrived at the Newberry National Volcanic Monument. We aimed to do a hike but couldn’t find the trail head anywhere?! Things were very poorly signposted. It was no Yosemite.

Pretty though

We also walked through the pitch black Lava River Cave, which is an underground tunnel formed by lava. It was freezing down there and without our headlamps was completely dark, hence no photos. It was interesting though.

To celebrate making it out of the tunnel we headed to the Deschutes Brewery, the place that makes the beer we had at Crater Lake.

There was cheesy jalapeno dip on the menu, it would have been rude not to order it…

Sunset

The next day we packed up camp and journeyed on to Mt Hood.

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Oregon, Road Trip, Travel | Leave a comment

Crater Lake, Oregon

Posted on June 19, 2015 by Bec

Today officially marks 5 weeks in America! The first thing I would recommend to anyone coming to the west coast is Crater Lake. After we decided to bypass Shasta Lake and head into Oregon early we had an extra night up our sleeves, so I suggested we head to Crater Lake after reading about it in the Lonely Planet guide.

An excellent idea, if I do say so myself. (warning, photo heavy post ahead)

Crater Lake was formed 7700 years ago when Mt Mazama’s eruption caused the mountain to collapse and form a caldera (cauldron or bowl) which filled with snow melt and rain to make a lake.

The water is such a violent shade of blue, I’m not sure the photos do it justice.

How is this real?

We arrived in the afternoon and took a drive around the rim, stopping at every vista to feast our eyes (and our camera memory cards).

The small island in the photo below is a smaller volcano.

The views looking away from the lake are also jaw-dropping:

SNOW!

My Australian brain can’t seem to comprehend how there can still be snow in early summer.

After a couple of hours of marvelling we went to the campground to pitch our tent. I can’t believe I haven’t introduced the main players in our trip yet! Meet Cole:

He’s the roof over our heads.

And Mrs Hawn, Goldie for short:

She keeps us moving

We went to the camp store (and saw the box of free stuff for Pacific Crest Trail Hikers! Those who have read Wild will know what I’m talking about) to purchase some supplies, including this amazing beer.

Made at the Deschutes Brewery in nearby Bend.

After dinner we got the campfire going, not because it was particularly freezing.

But for S’mores!

Ingredients

Roasting the mallow

S’mores are of course a delicate marrying of a roasted marshmallow and a piece of chocolate, wedged between two sweet crackers:

A classic S’more

Nice roasting

Andrew spread peanut butter on his cracker to make a gourmet S’more.

Peanut butter S’more

The next day, having slept off the inevitable sugar high and low, we set out to hike Garfield Peak, a short 5km walk.

If possible, the lake looked an even deeper blue in the morning light.

The views from the top were incredible:

Yep, that’s snow

Me, with bizarrely large looking feet

The trail involved crossing over some snow, which we found pretty exciting.

A local told us not to cross over snow… But it was pretty soft and not slippery and falling wouldn’t have resulted in plunging to our respective deaths… Small calculated risks keep the dream alive.

Again, the view looking away from the lake was pretty damn great as well:

Oh hey snow capped mountain in the distance

A seriously beautiful place, do get there if you can!

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, Crater Lake, Oregon, Road Trip, Travel | 6 Comments

Leaving California, arriving in Oregon

Posted on June 18, 2015 by Bec

After we left Lake Tahoe we drove to a campground on the Sacramento River at a place called Colusa. Along the way we stopped at Folsom, to check out the prison synonymous with Johnny Cash. He performed two concerts there in 1968 which resulted in the album At Folsom Prison. I recreated his pose at the front gate:

They let him get closer.

When we got out of the car at Folsom the first thing that struck us was the heat. Having been mostly cold up until that point, 39 degrees C hit us in the face with the force of a thousand suns. We looked through the prison’s tiny museum, marvelling at the contraband prisoners managed to sneak inside in a myriad of… interesting ways.

Colusa was one of those unexpected gems. The campground was delightfully green and clean and practically deserted. The nearby Sacramento River looked just like a scene from a summer camp movie and we jumped in to cool off.

Momentarily refreshed, we went back to camp and drank gin and tonics and munched on chips and salsa. It was all delightfully simple and relaxing.

It was stinking hot overnight and sleeping was tough, but hey, it wasn’t like we had work the next morning!

Then next day we drove to Lake Shasta, where we were supposed to stay for two nights. But the lake was seriously low due to the drought and the area was deserted, a few ambitious boaters were in the water, but mostly it was just creepily deserted campgrounds and motels dotted around empty roads.

So we made an executive decision to leave California two days early and head into Oregon.

Ashland, OR

The campground was just outside Ashland, known for it’s practically year-long Shakespeare Festival. Ashland felt like a town from a movie, or from a show like Gilmore Girls or Hart of Dixie. Adorably quaint, clean, full of flowers and trees and ice cream shops.

I love Shakespeare, I’ve seen The Merry Wives of Windsor in Stratford upon Avon (Shakespeare’s hometown in England) and As You Like It at the Old Vic in London. I would have loved to have seen a show in Ashland, but having not booked ahead there were only expensive tickets left. Something our budget doesn’t really allow.

So we explored the town. Have you seen a more adorable looking police station?!

A serious crime fighting precinct, no doubt

And we look a long walk through Lithia Park.

The next day we did some errands in nearby Medford and then relaxed on the shores of Emigrant Lake.

Colorado beers in Oregon

Or change in schedule allowed for a night at Crater Lake, which we otherwise wouldn’t have done. This is kind of crazy because I think Crater Lake turned out to be the highlight of our trip so far, more soon!

Posted in Travel | Tagged America, California, Oregon, Road Trip | 1 Comment

Lake Tahoe

Posted on June 9, 2015 by Bec

Time for a map update!

Looking a bit more exciting now

On Sunday we hired a kayak and paddled around Emerald Bay at Lake Tahoe.

The water is incredibly clear

Local geese

In the middle of the bay is Fannette Island, which still has the structure of a ‘tea house’ built by the owner of a mansion on the main land called Vikingsholm. Mrs Lora Josephine Knight had the mansion built in 1929.

Fannette Island

We kayaked over to the island and climbed onto land.

Inside the tea house

And then we paddled back.

Posted in Travel | Tagged California, Lake Tahoe, Travel | 1 Comment

Panorama Trail, Yosemite

Posted on June 8, 2015 by Bec

On day two of our Yosemite adventure we hiked the Panorama Trail, 13.5km starting from spectacular Glacier Point and ending with the Mist Trail which goes alongside two waterfalls, Nevada and Vernal Falls.

We left our car on the Valley floor and took a bus up to Glacier Point. The tickets were $25 each and we soon found out why, it was a ‘tour’ up to the point. Meaning a rather in-articulate guide prattled on and on the entire windy trip up. I know I’m being rude but it was super annoying! And I really to feel that nailing diction is an important part of public speaking. Which this guide did not.

Anyway. The views from Glacier Point were out of this world.

Look at those tiny trees on the valley floor!

Some ~~stupid~~ brave people stood on that rock jutting out in the below photo to pose for a picture.

I couldn’t watch

About to head off

The first half of the hike was magic. We strolled along at a decent pace, chatting and joking away.

Admiring the views

We hiked down the sides of the two waterfalls in the below photo plus smaller Illilouette Fall:

Wowza

There were signs advising us not to swim at the top of the falls…

I can’t think why:

Scary

The top of Nevada Fall

The top of Vernal Fall:

I hiked the Mist Trail back in 2010 with my friend Kate and we got absolutely drenched, this didn’t happen again.

Here’s what Vernal Fall looked like last week:

Compared to what it looked like 5 years ago:

A raging torrent

To say I found the second half of the hike (descending) difficult is probably an understatement. Again my knees were hating life and making things challenging. It also poured with rain and I slipped over. There is an option to take part of the John Muir Trail down to the valley instead of the Mist Trail, which we probably should have done. Live and learn.

Leaving Yosemite

The next day we got up slowly and hobbled around packing up camp (or maybe it was just me hobbling).

We drove out of the park to the east on our way to Lake Tahoe and got to check out plenty of other great areas. As we wound around the park we started to see glimpses of snow capped mountains, and got ridiculously excited.

Tuolumne Meadows:

Swoon

Outside the park we stopped briefly at Inyo National Forest:

Andrew looks tiny

Along the drive the Sierra Nevada mountain range kept popping up into view, taking my breath away.

Sigh

And finally, finally, somewhere near the California-Nevada border I got to take a photo of Smokey the bear:

Mission completed

We crossed over into Nevada briefly on our way to Lake Tahoe and about 50 metres in spotted a casino, a mine and a gun store. Nice.

calif

Posted in Travel | Tagged California, Travel, Yosemite | Leave a comment

Yosemite National Park

Posted on June 7, 2015 by Bec

We arrived at inimitable Yosemite in the late afternoon, pitched our tent at Crane Flat campground and drove into the valley to look around.

We drove through a tunnel and were immediately greeted with this view:

Which I thought was jaw-dropping, but after two days of even better vistas I feel like that photo is kind of dull!

It was my second trip to Yosemite and it was even better than I remembered, albeit a bit drier with the drought California is experiencing.

Check out this waterfall:

2015

Back in 2010

Pretty stark difference.

The next day Andrew woke at the crack of dawn, loudly unzipped the tent and bounded outside. This was his version of Disneyland (remember I was so excited I couldn’t sleep?) and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so pumped.

I followed a short while after and when I stuck my bleary-eyed head out of the tent I was greeted with this:

Which was pretty magical. I whipped up some porridge to sustain us for a big day of hiking ahead.

SO. EXCITED.

After breakfast we jumped in the car, headed into the valley and checked out Lower Yosemite Falls.

Hike to Columbia Rock

Our first hike was 2.5km up the Yosemite Falls Trail to Columbia Rock, because we wanted somewhere picturesque to eat lunch.

This section of the trail has a ridiculous number of switchbacks (a path that zigzags agonisingly slow upwards) and the research I’ve done since the hike suggest this is the hardest section of the trail. What a place to start!

The view along the way

The view of Half Dome from Columbia Rock was spectacular.

That’s Half Dome in the background

There is a sheer drop behind that extremely low safety rail.

I am petrified

We ate our sandwiches and Andrew convinced me to hike a bit further to get a view of the waterfall.

There she is. Oh and Andrew.

Going down the trail was worse than going up. I have horrendous knees (it’s a family thing) and they didn’t love cushioning the rest of me on each laboured step downwards.

Tunnel View

After the hike we drove to Tunnel View to check out the iconic Yosemite vista immortalised by photographer Ansel Adams.

That’s it.

Hike to Mirror Lake

In the afternoon we hiked to Mirror Lake and back, about 5km on a gloriously flat trail. As the name suggests, the lake mirrored it’s surrounds beautifully.