Over the past week and a half I spent some time up in the great Northwest and parts of California. I thought I would tell you a little about what I did. I left on Saturday morning and headed up to Washington driving all day to get there. We stopped
at Multnomah waterfalls on the Columbia Gorge in Oregon and then we stopped again in Gresham to visit the family I lived with when I was up there for 8 months. We continued on and arrived in Olympia pretty late.
One of the days we headed to Quinault Rain
forest and walked around. It was about a 4-mile hike. It was awesome to be in a
jungle type place again. It reminded me a ton of Pohnpei, which got me stoked
for my trip back there in September. The trees there were huge, some of them up
to 300 feet tall. We saw the world’s largest spruce tree, which was over 50
feet in circumference at the base. It was gigantic!!!
Another
adventure we had was to the San Juan Islands. We drove up to Anacortes and then
hopped on a ferry ride. We barely made it on the ferry but we made it. The ride
took about an hour or so. It was my first time on a ferry. Once we go to San Juan we headed out kayaking.
The kayaks had foot pedals so we could use those to get around instead of paddles,
which freed up our hands. That was really nice. We cruised around for about two
hours. It was a ton of fun. It’s so beautiful up there. Our original plan was to sleep over there but we decided to
go back. We caught the 10 pm ferry which ended up stopping at Shaw, Orca, and
Lopez islands so we didn’t get off until 12 and then we had a 2 ½ hour drive
home.
One of the nights we went to a Seattle
Mariners game. It was pretty cool to go watch. It was my first time at a major
league baseball game. The Mariners crazily pull off a win in the bottom of the
ninth inning when the batter hit a right fielder and the man on 2nd
ran in. The catcher had the ball and touched him but the ball flew out of the
catcher’s mitt in the action and he was called safe. We also took a ferry up
there from Bremerton but we just drove home. It was cool to go up into downtown
Seattle.
That’s
pretty much all we did up in Washington but this is where the road trip begins. We drove over to the coast through
Astoria and drove past Seaside, Cannon, Tillamook, and New Port. We stopped at
the Tillamook Cheese factory and got some ice cream and cheese. At New Port we
cut inland and drove just south of Eugene were we spent the night. The next day
we drove to Crater Lake. I can’t even start to describe how gorgeous it is
there. The water was so BLUE. A blue I’ve never seen before it was amazing. I’m glad we were able to
see it!!! From there we drove to Crescent City, California, which is back on
the coast. We went to the local beach and hung out for about an hour. It was awesome to be on the beach with the sun
low on the horizon and the moon just coming up on the other.
Nature just amazes me. I love being
out in it. The next day we drove down the coast to the Redwood
National Park. We stopped at a groove called Lady Bird Johnson. It was about a
mile loop hike. The trees were absolutely huge!!!! Towering around 200 feet
tall or more with some bases about 70 feet or more around. They were
really big. It was really foggy also which made it awesome. We then continued driving. We took the back road out which winded through
mountains. We ended at Redding and then took another semi back road to Reno
where we hopped on I-80 all the way back to Salt Lake City.
This trip
has been truly amazing!!!! It’s been spectacular to drive to the places we have
and seen such beauty. It really testifies of the Lord’s hand in all things.
Things this amazing just couldn’t have appeared out of nowhere. The earth was
truly created by a higher power and by someone who loves us. I was just in awe at every stop. I’m so
grateful for the opportunity I’ve had to see these places!!!!
If you want to see pictures click
HERE and it will take you to my Facebook page. Hope you enjoy!
