The Pacific Ocean!

After our time in Portland/Mt. Hood, we loaded back into the car for the drive to San Francisco. We split the drive up into two days, because it was so far. Driving day #1 took us from Mt. Hood, Oregon to Crescent City, California. It included a lot of snacks and a lot of napping (on Becca's part).

The drive was beautiful and we our third rainbow of the trip on this day. I was hoping you could see it in this picture, but you can't...luckily the mountains are pretty!

We stayed at The Crescent Beach Motel (John, Becca and I's first motel!) and our rooms had sliding doors right to the ocean. The Pacific Ocean was one of the things I was most excited about for our trip, so our arrival at the motel after a whole day of driving was very exciting.

Even thought it was 50 degrees and misting, Shannon and I took our shoes off and headed toward the ocean. I had grand plans of putting on my swim suit and just getting in, but it was really too cold for that.

Look how excited I am! The beach was really incredible and I would recommend the motel even if motels aren't your thing.

That night we had take out for dinner and watched the Royals play the San Francisco Giants. It was at this point that as a non-baseball follower I realized that we were going to be pulling into San Francisco the evening of the last game...just as it was wrapping up. AND Shannon is a Royals fan. It was a high stress situation.

The next morning we woke up, took a few more photos, and got back  in the car to go explore the Redwoods (another post, potentially two) and drive to San Francisco.


We only had to drive about 20 minutes to the Redwoods, but the drive was so beautiful we ended up stopping a few times.

At this spot, we were pulling into the pull off just as another car was pulling out. When they saw us pull in, the car stopped abruptly and a guy in his twenties jumped out and started running toward us, arms flailing above his head "DO YOU GUYS WANT A PICTURE????"

The answer was that yes, we did want a picture. John got totally flustered though (because of the yelling and the guy's rapid approach) and said "Nah, man...we're good". So this is the best picture we have. For our next trip, we're going to get a selfie stick.

In & Around Mt. Hood

After our day in Portland, we had one full day to explore Mt. Hood, Oregon and the area around it. For some reason, we were all up at 6:30 AM our first morning there, which was great because we were able to watch the sun come up. We arrived in the pitch dark the night before so we had no idea that this was what our patio overlooked...so pretty!

Shannon's lovely friends, Maureen and Brooke, not only offered to be our Oregon wilderness tour guides for the day BUT they also brought us Voodoo Donuts, they are the best! I've been friends with Becca for a long time and I've never seen her more excited. I think her exact words were "I've been waiting my whole life to eat these donuts".

After we ate our fill of donuts, we hopped in our crazy, tiny minivan (that wasn't quite a minivan) and head out into the great outdoors (can you tell from the tone of this post already that I don't do the outdoors very well?)!

We took a scenic drive up, up, up a mountain and then all the way down...getting out along the way to appreciate the views and take some pictures.

Maureen and Brooke are legit nature lovers and knew all the best routes and things to see. I think the should open a tour guide business, but they seem to already have full time jobs. I really think they could make a killing though...look at this view!

In the New Student Seminar I'm teaching this semester, we read Wild and wouldn't you know it, we accidentally found a part of the Pacific Crest Trail! I exclaimed "STOP THE CAR! I need to get out to take a picture for my students!" John stared at me in disbelief that I was actually going to send them pictures from our vacation but you guys, I take my teaching very seriously.

And then I pretended to warm myself near this fire pit and yes, this is one of two pictures that I sent to them (all 50 of them) when I got back to New York. The message included, "Please note that much like Cheryl, I wore inappropriate footwear" (leopard sneakers). I like to think that they thought I was super cool, but really they probably just rolled their eyes. 

We drove to Multnomah Falls, which I loved so much. 

Here's a picture of me and John getting drenched. I could have stood there for an hour, but John didn't have a rain jacket on and it was pretty cold. No one else came up with us and when we came down soaked and grinning they looked at us like we were kind of nuts. 

AND THEN Brooke and Maureen took us to the fish hatchery, which was the coolest. I think they thought I was kidding with how excited I was because they just met me and really, how excited could a person be at a fish hatchery? If you're me, very excited.

There are people who work in the fish hatchery whose job it is to count the salmon as they swim upstream. During prime mating season, they could count up to 20,000 fish per hour. Isn't that incredible? If possible they also take not of physical characteristics and size of this fish...look how big that one is!

We also got to go see Herman the Sturgeon! Herman weights almost 500 pounds and is more than 70 years old! I didn't get a good picture of him, so you can Google it, but you should definitely go see him if you can. I loved him!

Please take a moment to enjoy this photo of me and Becca...

In typical Kate fashion, after the excitement of the day, I promptly got in the way back of our mini-minivan and fell asleep on our drive to the Timberline Lodge for dinner. I woke up and it was winter, full fledged with snow and everything! The temperature had dropped and I was not dressed appropriately at all.

If you made it to the end of this super long post, you are dedicated readers. Mt. Hood is beautiful and you should visit! Get the clam chowder at the Lodge! If you need advice on what to see, I would really call Brooke and Maureen...they can make you like the outdoors even if you don't ordinarily! Doesn't it look like I do the outdoors all the time from this post? I know, its a miracle!

Some Things to See (and eat) in Portland

I need to start this post by saying flat out that I am not cool enough to live in Portland. I know that a lot of young people are packing up and heading West, but I am not that person. With that being said, we liked Portland! Here are some things we did!

We went to Powell's Books. John and I l-o-v-e-d it! Its basically The Strand but bigger and more open and a normal temperature (I always feel like I going to melt in The Strand). Everything is very well organized with places to sit and a coffee shop!

Then we walked up the block to Blue Star Donuts (DON'T FREAK OUT everyone, we ate Voodoo too, its coming in another post) and they were great! I especially loved the one that had an accidental heart in the middle of it. I especially especially loved that John and I ate three donuts between us on the way to lunch and had no shame. Being married, man. Its super great. (Not great: the gym this week where I feel as though the donuts are lodged in my upper stomach)

We were going to go to Por Que No? for tacos but there was a line out the door. Apparently the line moves super fast but we were non-cool tourists who didn't know that. Luckily my friends all commented on my Instagram and said that we NEEDED to go to Pine State Biscuits right this second. They were totally correct and you also need to go right this second. John got something called The Reggie which included cheese and gravy. I went with something that had lettuce on it, but let's not kid ourselves: there was also fried chicken,bacon and ranch dressing. So much eating.

AND THEN John told me that he had spotted a yarn store on our walk to the restaurant and did I want to go in? YES! I do want to go in John! When have I ever said no to yarn?

A note about yarn and vacation: I brought no yarn with me. I thought it was only 8 days and I could not crochet for 8 days. That was a mistake. Portland was day 3 of our trip and no lie, my hands were starting to get itchy from their stillness. SO I did what any self-respecting crocheter would do: I bought more than $50 worth of fancy yarn and am currently crocheting myself a present in between all my holiday gifts and charity pieces. I even got patterns with my yarn purchases, so I can't recommend Close Knit enough!

After the yarn store, we met back up with Becca and Shannon and their friends' apartment AND THEN we went to a dinner that was three hours and six courses. I have no pictures of it because we were literally exhausted (maybe jet lagged?) and in a food coma within seconds of eating the second course. It was a terrible food day. And by that I mean it was a day filled with really great food.

HOORAY PORTLAND! Over and out.

20 Hours in Seattle

After a moderately horrible (maybe moderately is an understatement?) start to our trip, we arrived in Seattle after a 12 hour stay in JFK, a flight to Portland, 8 hours in a Portland airport hotel (not as terrible as it sounds) and then a three hour drive to Seattle.

We stayed at The Hotel Maxwell which we would totally recommend (we had a view of the Space Needle from our room!) and after dropping our stuff in our rooms, we made a quick escape into the rain to make the most of our 20 hours in the city (seriously, we hate you JetBlue). 

In case you were wondering, people are NOT kidding about the rain in Seattle.

It was drizzling on our way in from Portland, but by the time we had finished lunch and started to work our way to the Space Needle it was downright pouring. I think the Space Needle would have been slightly more fun had it not been raining sideways at the top.

The woman also told us on the way down that the Space Needle sways something like 1 inch for every 10 miles per hour of wind. I wasn't really into it...I like my buildings to remain stationary. 

Then we made our way to Pike Place Market, which I was SO excited for. I loved nearly everything but I EXTRA loved the flower stands. They had the most beautiful bouquets for under $10. Becca and I walked the whole row of them, while John and Shannon wandered somewhere wondering what was taking us so long.

AND we found the Gum Wall. Let's talk about the Gum Wall, shall we?

I kind of assumed going in that the Gum Wall would be gross. Its literally thousands of pieces of chewed gum, so OK yes its a given: grossness.

IT WAS SO MUCH GROSSER THAN I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE.

AND...it smelled.

Ugh. I'm sorry if I'm ruining your plans to go visit the Gum Wall (I think you should still go) but I think you just need to be prepared for what you're getting yourself into.

That night before dinner, we went to Rachel's Ginger Beer (there's so much stuff to do in that Market!). I can't recommend this place enough...we LOVED it! They make cocktails and non-alcoholic beverages out of this delicious ginger beer, which I didn't even think I liked! I had a Moscow Mule with Blueberry Gingerbeer and it was basically the best thing I've ever had in my entire life. I like Moscow Mules, I am so hip!

After dinner (seriously this was one of the longest days of my life) we went to a bar that had a very old lady drinking at the bar (and her wheelchair parked next to her), clowns hanging from the ceiling, terrible scary circus music in the bathroom and a whole back room of pinball machines for John to play! He was thrilled and so was I because he got rid of all my quarters. Side note: I am WAY too much of a control freak for pinball and I'm terrible at it.

And then we went back to the hotel and fell asleep at 8:30PM. #vacation

The next morning, we loaded into the car at 8:00AM to head to Portland...but first we made a quick stop at the Freemont Troll!

I was excited for the Troll but I was kind of like "meh, its a sculpture...how impressive could it be?" The answer is SUPER impressive! We had a great visit and it was even better because we were the only ones there.

Shannon climbed to the very top of his head (Becca nearly passed out watching her) but I stuck to the lower parts of his body.

Seattle, you were great! We'll try to stay more than 20 hours next time!

Nearly Ten Years of Friendship: A Photo Journey

I met Becca on the first day of our college Orientation in July of 2005 (that is so long ago I could cry). She kind of scared me because she had a nose ring, but we started talking anyway.

Almost ten years later, we've probably taken hundreds of pictures together. Potentially thousands. In that time, I'd like to say that we've perfected the photo taking but I would be lying to you.

These pictures kill me and I had to share them. It sums up the process we go through for nearly every picture we've ever taken together.

"John! Take a picture of me and Becca on the top of the Space Needle!"

"Hold on, I have to zipper my jacket"

"Should our hoods be up?"

"No, the hood should definitely be down. How does my hair look? I feel like its flat from the rain, is it flat from the rain?"

"No, OK let's keep the hoods up."

Upon reviewing my pictures later that day I realized that Becca's eyes are closed.

Nailed it.

Leavin' On A Jet Plane

Tomorrow morning, we're getting in a cab at 6:30AM (John is going to be super pleasant, let me tell you) and heading to JFK to head to the West Coast for nine days!

I'm excited for the Space Needle in Seattle (so touristy, I know), Powell's Books in Portland and Alcatraz on Halloween! And we get to see my Twin, Tammy AND we are driving through the Redwood Forest! AH!

I'm also aiming to get a super great picture of me and John for us to use on our Christmas card this year. Is that incredibly vain of me? I love Christmas cards!

I'll see you when I get back...I'll miss you!

Once My Parents Took Me to The Bermuda Triangle

Back in July, we went on a cruise to celebrate my Dad's 60th Birthday! John is MIA from all of these pictures because welp, he wasn't there. He doesn't get many vacation days (I get basically 100) so he stayed home with Dilly and Zula so that we could use a bunch of his vacation days next week on the West Coast.

My parents had gone a cruise last summer with their friends and they loved it! Alyssa was less sold on the idea because she "doesn't like boats." Really I'm think she was uneasy about being stuck with us for a week with nowhere to go but over the edge and into the ocean :)

Turns out, I love cruises! You get to read tons of books, the ocean is mezmerizing and you are literally unable to check your work email unless you want to pay for the internet...which we did not. So, no email for 5 whole days!

Our cruise was basically what you would think it would be: pool, nap, eat lunch, nap, lay in the sun, nap, get in a screaming match with your sister after your paddle boat breaks and you're convinced that you're stranded forever, forcing your sister to jump out of the boat and pull you to shore.

BUT THEN our parents took us to The Bermuda Triangle! "A Night Cruise", they told us..."we did it last year and it was beautiful," they said.

They may have mentioned to us that we were going to The Triangle, but frankly I don't remember. We got on the boat though, our Captain (who'd I'd like to mention was Alyssa's age) announced that we'd be to The Triangle in less than 40 minutes. HA HA HA I thought...WHAT A JOKE! Not a joke. We were actually going AND THEN we were going to park ourselves there so that we could look through the glass bottom of the boat. REALLY GUYS? That's what we're doing? Alright, fine.

It was beautiful and we had so much fun but then it was dark and we were still in The Bermuda Triangle and I thought to myself that we had tempted fate enough and we should really get back to the ice cream machine and the cruise ship that it was on. In case you haven't realized it yet, I didn't disappear into The Bermuda Triangle, but it was a close one, friends. It really was.

I've got about 20 pictures of my Dad like this. He loved that balcony!

On our last day, the ocean was pretty rough. Thankfully, we all had seasick patches on so no one even thought about vomiting, but Alyssa was feeling it in the afternoon.

And then we had our last dinner on the ship and headed home (after waiting in this ship's ice skating rink for our disembarking time...that's a thing, in case you've never been on a cruise). 60th birthday cruise, you were so fun! PS-on a cruise you have the same waiter at dinner every night? Alyssa actually loved ours and I think that if had asked her to stay on the cruise ship with him forever she would have overlooked the teeny tiny showers and done it.

The End! Sorry about the million pictures (but not really).