Redwood National Forest

Soon after the expansive coasts of Oregon and Northern California ("NorCal" for the hip), we encountered the gigantic trees of the Redwood National Forest.

Again - pictures do not quite capture how immense these trees are.

After leaving the park, we encountered another attraction called something like "the drive-thru tree". It turns out to be a little private park that charges a $5 entrance. It is not worth it, but it is a laugh. Unfortunately our camera battery died before this attraction, but it has been captured on Sharon's phone.

I've read that there are a number of these trees in existence, where in the early days, entrepreneurs would fleece tourists for the privilege of driving through a redwood that had a hole bored through it. As for the one we saw, we were doubtful our little car would fit through it. It probably could, but it wasn't worth the risk!

After more hours of driving, we reached a destination that we had actually booked a hotel in advance for. Very nice after a long day!

Oregon and Northern California coasts

Our first stop after Bandon (did you see the ghost?) we stopped in a small town called Port Orford.

Really, there didn't seem much reason to stop other than it had a hill with "ocean view" and arrows painted on the road. Seriously, after that much driving and our overloaded senses, it was that simple drawing us in. Well, it wasn't a trap, as we pulled up to a gorgeous view and a very friendly couple from Central California. They are almond farmers who had bought a place up there for vacation because they loved it so much. She collects agate stones on the beach and decided she wanted to give me her find that morning. Lovely.

We chatted for a while and looked out for the whale they came out to see that was apparently still hanging out in the harbour before migrating south, and when we realized he had likely moved on, we parted ways.
The next part of our trip consisted mostly of conversation between Joe and I. It's funny that after weeks of being contained in the same box on wheels you can still find something to talk about!

Our conversation went something like "OOOOH!" and "pull over so I can take a picture", "wow! look at that!" This was only briefly punctuated with a stop at the California border for an agricultural search (really it was just a friendly conversation about what we were carrying in our packed to the gills little car...and if any of it was fruit. We had one apple, and they thought that would be okay). Sorry, no pictures of this apple.

We had heard over and over that driving down the Oregon coast into California was the way to go - we would have to agree. The evidence speaks for itself.

Eugene, Oregon Wineries, Bandon

As indicated in our last post, Portland pretty much ran out of room for the like of us. So we opted to keep moving on to Eugene, which according to our Lonely Planet guide, is a cool little town.

We stayed at the Campus Inn, after eating at the Ambrosia, where we tried some local Oregon wine from the Willamette valley.

Like Washington, Oregon is also a state that makes good wine in the shadow of mighty California. So we had to check our some wineries the next day as we continued south into the Umpqua Valley.

Wineries included Benton Lane, Chateau Lorane, and Pfeiffer Vineyards. The latter is nifty to note, as they are a solar-powered winery, provided the wine for Obama's pre-inaugural celebration at the White House, and offered an intense tasting experience with Robin Pfeiffer himself in a back room of "the cave".

We were provided with a Riedel glass specifically designed for Oregon wines. Yes, that sounds ridiculous, but it is a cool glass that we got to keep! And use later during our trip.

Robin did provide some unique tips for wine tasting, through red teeth. Highlights include:

1. Swirling the glass over a candle (a "living light source"), while watching the colours dance in your wife's face. "You will never see a wine more beautiful." Smooth, Robin... very smooth.
2. Nose the wine once. Why would you keep smelling it if you didn't like it the first time?
3. Wine does not want to be alone. It wants to be married... with food that is.

This experience took about an hour and was quite enjoyable. Highly recommended! And you can only get their wines from there. His wife Danuta mans the front area and does the white wine tasting, while Robin does the reds.

Venturing out to the coast, we encountered the Oregon Dunes of Siltcoos.

As we keep driving south, it was getting late, so we decided to stay in Bandon (as in "abandon"), a nifty town on the coast. Dined on local seafood at the old-school Wheelhouse Restaurant, and called it a night.

Enhancing the image above this one, I discovered a ghost! (bottom left)

Portland

We checked in fairly late at the ultra-cool Hotel Modera in Portland. It's connected to a cool restaurant that had live jazz playing upon our arrival.

We were lucky, as the Portland Marathon was beginning that weekend, and vacancy was very low in Portland. In fact, it was so low, it coerced us into leaving town later the next day instead of staying... more on that later.

Next morning, and armed with a list of places to see, we set out about town. In search of food, of course. First, we walked to the Farmer's market, which was probably one of the best I've ever been too. This city is very much into local/organic/whole foods, and variety was... um... varietous.

Unfortunately we have no pictures of the market because our camera was out of service, because someone (Sharon) forgot to charge the battery.

However, here is a picture of a funky apple I ate later in the day...

After moderately filling our stomachs, we returned to the hotel, retrieved a charged camera battery, and set upon the town once again on Portland's FREE downtown transportation system (buses and streetcars), heading up to the Pearl district to the Pearl Bakery.

Portland is a foodie's city. And we'll have barely scraped the surface with our quick tour of the area.

Wandering westwards, we encountered the infamous Powell's Books, which in fact, is many buildings of bookstores. We entered the main one, and found too much to absorb for one visit. 

The prices are sweet, and the variety here is also varietous. Also keep in mind the prices are in US, not those jacked-up Canadian prices you see on the back of all books. Oh yeah, and Oregon has no sales tax!

We left with 180 pounds of books. And it rained pretty much the whole day. And we learned that "true" Portlanders don't use umbrellas. We compromised and wore raincoats.

Bringing style to the Portland area

We stopped at Rogue Distillery and Public House (sorry again, no pictures) for some local brews and a bite, wandered around a little more, and left with tears in our eyes (ok, rain) for the next destination.

Goodbye, Portland!

We were told by reliable sources that Portland was an incredible place to see, and would make up for us skipping Seattle. While we can't comment on Seattle, Portland is indeed worthy of a more thorough visit.

More masochistic behaviour

After that harrowing experience at Quinault in Olympic National Park, we had worked up a bit of a hunger.

Passing by a fast-food strip in the town of Elma reminded me that I had yearned to have some KFC in the USA. Why, I do not know, as I do not eat KFC regularly nor have any desire to during my regular life. However I somehow convinced Sharon we had to take care of some fast food tastings as well... and it happened.

My original plan of trying the standard 2-piece meal was replaced when I saw a "deal" that we do not have in Canada, but have only dreamed of... in disgust. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, the Double Down:

The double-down sandwich on the left is the ultimate expression of fast-food-meat-packing gluttony. Instead of bread, it's chicken. And in between the "chicken-bread", lies cheese, bacon, and some ridiculously high-fat creamy sauce. And even more ludicrous are the sauces they give you for dipping, as if the cream-covered secret herbs and spices from the Colonel wasn't enough.

And note in also pictured sauces, they aren't real. It's not honey, it's "honey sauce": corn syrup, then honey. It's not butter, it's "buttery spread"... I can't remember what's in that, but it isn't margarine either. And don't forget to have some ranch with that.

Surprisingly, it wasn't bad.

Port Angeles and Olympic National Park

Later in the afternoon, we took yet another ferry, this time to Port Angeles. 

We did not intend for this leg of our journey to take so long, so we ended up staying overnight in Port Angeles (which has nothing much angelic about it, according to Lonely Planet). But we did find this to be one of the most friendliest places so far! Even a gas station attendant provided us with more tourist info than your average tour guide.

We had dinner at the surprisingly good, hipster Soho Asian Bistro, and stayed at the surprisingly good Olympic Lodge. The delay in our travels was a good thing. Having my own personal pool and hot tub was a bonus.

Oh yes! Before I forget, allow me to resolve the cliffhanger from an earlier post. Right before we left Victoria, we had mailed Joanna her condo/garage keys that I had kept by accident. And then when we unpacked our stuff at the Olympic Lodge, I realized we had forgotten our garment bag in our last hotel... in Victoria. It had our wedding dress attire, and some other dressy clothes - so we'll survive. Lucky for us, the hotel still had it, and we arranged to have Rich pick it up for us.

Next day was a day of sights, at Olympic National Park. Getting there was beautiful in itself:

We also passed by a town that is quite popular with teen girls. For those familiar with the Twilight series, it is based in Forks, Washington. We had not known this beforehand, but couldn't help it when encountering a few Twilight-focused shops.

Neither Sharon nor I are familiar with the books/movies, but I imagined that if a vampire or werewolf were to come out of those magical forests and approach us, we'd probably tell them how cute they are.

Onward to massive Olympic park, one of the few temperate rainforests in the world. Our first inland trip was to Hoh forest, where lush vegetation is EVERYWHERE.

... and the firs are MASSIVE:

(Sharon is at the end of this fallen tree)

After spending some time hiking the Hoh, we continued the drive south and checked out a couple of beaches:

Searching for clams

Searching for meaning

Searching for critters to talk to

After the coast, I hadn't had enough forest, so we drove around Lake Quinault. I'd include some more pictures but haven't, because:

1) the internet connection at this point in time is incredibly slow uploading pictures,

2) it looks much the same as the Hoh forest above, and

3) we didn't take many pictures of the Quinault forest because I was driving and Sharon was scared to death.

Why was she scared to death? Because:

4) it was getting darker and darker as we progressed through the thick canopy, and the increasing fog wasn't helping,

5) the road got narrower, especially when we were beside cliffs that sharply dropped off,

6) there was nobody around for miles to hear our screams should we fall off the cliff,

7) ...and she could tell I was starting to get a little scared myself, because of how nicely I was acting towards her.

Obviously we survived and caught a few more nice scenes on our way out:

That was enough excitement for the day - and we headed down to Oregon into the night.