Our first stop on the trip was a place we like to go in Oregon and have been many times, Cape Lookout State Park. The campground is right beside a beach and has lots of places nearby to explore. Once we got camp set up we took a stroll down the beach and enjoyed our first campfire. The next day Chris decided to run the length of the beach only to find out that it was 18km round trip. Let's just say he was pretty hungry by the time he got back for breakfast. Then we headed out to the little town and beach of Oceanside. There's a cool tunnel in the rock there that takes you to a smaller more private beach so we headed over there and read our books for a few hours enjoying the sun and breeze by the the ocean. That night was probably our worst night of being in the tent. It rained a lot more than we expected and we just happened to put our tent in a spot where the puddles liked to form. Our stuff got quite wet but it dried out fast for our next stop in the Redwoods.
Our campsite at the Redwoods was probably my favorite. There were so many cool little sites, some like ours that you had to go up a few steps to get to and then it felt like you had the place to yourself. We spent our first night strolling the campground and having snacks by the fire. Our full day at the Redwoods was one of my favorites of the trip. We started out by driving to Jedediah State Park where we drove down a narrow dirt road amongst the massive Redwoods and then did a little walking loop to see some big trees. Then we headed back up the road a bit and did about a 3 hour hike into the Redwoods where we ended up at the Boy Scout tree which is a huge double Redwood tree that was amazing to see. Once we got back from our hike we went back to our site for a bit and had supper. Then we headed down to Enderts Beach, where we had to climb through a hole in a sea rock to get to some cool tide pools that were full of things like starfish, mussels and sea anemone. The beach was basically all ours, I could've spent all day there. Once the sun started setting though we headed back up and went to the more accessible part of the beach to watch the 4th of July fireworks across the bay at Crescent City. It was quite cold sitting on the beach with the wind blowing but just when we were thinking there weren't going to be any fireworks, the show began. The next morning as we made our way down the coast we were sure to stop at one of the drive through trees and pay our $6 just to say that we have drove through a tree.
Our first night in the bay area was not in the city. We camped in probably one of the most original places ever. First I had to remember the combination to a lock to the gate that led us down a very narrow road right on the cliffside to a parking lot on a bluff jutting out into the ocean. Then we used the provided wheelbarrows to haul our stuff to our site on the bluff where it was wide open and the ocean was all around (good thing it didn't rain). We ate our cold left overs because it was so windy we couldn't get our stove to stay on and a fire was out of the question. After me laying on the tent so it wouldn't blow away while Chris set it up we headed back up the narrow steep road to Stinson beach which was a town we could see from our site. We walked the beach a bit but it was very cold in the wind so we decided to pack it in early and get into our tent where it was warm. The next day we drove to a spot that was supposed to be a great lookout of the Golden Gate Bridge and the city. Unfortunately the fog was so thick you couldn't see anything. We waited an hour to see if it would clear but it didn't so we drove down towards the city and by that time you could see most of the bridge as you got closer to it. We took a few pictures at a lookout and then made the trip across the bridge and parked so we could walk on the bridge for a bit. The wind was pretty cold but it was worth walking on the bridge and the fog even started clearing by the time we left. We made our way into the city and tried our hand at driving down the "crookedest" street before finding a decent place to park. The rest of the day we spent strolling along the Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39. We had our first try at eating In N Out and bought a kite at a very cool kite store. We were planning on riding a street car but the lines were so long that we just took a picture of one that was sitting on the road. I really enjoyed the atmosphere of San Francisco, it's definitely a city I would go to again. Of course before we headed to our hotel we had to check out the baseball park where they hit home runs in the bay behind the park.
The weather up until this point had been nice enough but not hot so we were ready for some nice hot weather by the time we got to Anaheim. We were not disappointed. Our first night in Anaheim we went to the Angels game with Kevin and Alysha and her family. It was a beautiful night for a game and we had tickets that let you eat endless amounts of hotdogs, pop, nachos, ice cream, peanuts and popcorn. The game wasn't too exciting but it was fun to be there. Our next day we were up in time to get to Disneyland when it opened. It felt like we had the park to ourselves as we went from ride to ride with very little line ups. The last time I was there they were just building Indiana Jones and didn't have such things as Fast Passes so this experience was much different, not having to wait in line for hours to get on the ride you wanted. We went hard in the morning going on all the rides that might get busier later in the day and then we headed back to the hotel for a nap and a little dip in the pool. We came back in the evening for more riding and watching the fireworks at night. I'd have to say my favorites were still the same as always, Splash Mountain and Space Mountain. Although I really used to like the Haunted House when I was really little, not quite as good this time around. The next day we did the same routine except this time we went to California Adventure. Chris and I liked this park the best. There was not as many little kiddy parts and the Disney part of it was pretty cool like Bugs Life and Cars. It was a little busier this day but we still got in a good amount of rides in the morning before heading back for our afternoon break. My favorite was the big roller coaster California Screamin' and the rafting one, Grizzly Mountain. One ride that was not my favorite was the Tower of Terror where you go up like 20 floors and then just drop and go up and drop again without knowing when or how far you're going to drop. I only went on that one once but I had a good time with Cole in Bug's Life while the others went on it again in the evening. We also watched the World of Color show that evening which was quite impressive to see. It's a whole bunch of fountains that they project cartoons onto and it was pretty cool to watch. This part of the trip was great seeing Kevin, Alysha and Cole; taking all the crazy rides together and making faces at all the cameras on them, pointing at everything with Cole and asking him where his nose was, definitely lots of good memories.
We started entering desert land on our way to the Grand Canyon. The views shifted from green and ocean to brown and dirt. Our hottest temperature we saw on the trip was during this drive at 118 Fahrenheit, which is around 48 Celsius. Good thing for air conditioning. This part of the drive was actually interesting because of all the different desert like mountains and we even some some pretty big dust twisters at one point. We got to the Grand Canyon later than expected so we didn't head to our campsite right away but instead went to check out the canyon. It was quite cloudy when we got there so the canyon was very full of shadows but it was still quite the sight. We took a free shuttle as far up the canyon as we could to watch the sunset and then by the time we got to our site it was around 9pm so Chris set up while I made some supper. The next morning we got up early so we could hike down into the canyon and I'm so glad we did. The first day there I felt we were kinda of jipped on what we got to see and do so this made up for it. The temperature was perfect at 7 in the morning to hike and we saw some amazing views from just hiking down a mile into the canyon. Then we quickly packed up and went for one more look of the canyon before heading back into the desert and driving to Las Vegas.
On our way to Vegas we stopped briefly at the Hoover Dam to check out how massive it was. We didn't spend too long there, just enough to drive over it and get a few pictures. I had got a good deal on a 5 star hotel in Vegas through Priceline and it sure was worth it. That hotel room was probably the fanciest we'll ever be in, on the 36th floor, huge bed, kitchen area with a little stove top, and even a light switch to roll down the blinds. We thought going into the city around 5pm would be a little cooler for walking around but it was still blazing hot as we stepped out the door. Walking the strip we took as many chances as we could to get to air conditioning. We figured we had to try some sort of casino game so we took our try at some black jack. I was on a roll but Chris made me stop when I had won 5 dollars. He lost his money on the first try. After supper at the Cheesecake Factory we walked the strip at night, checked out the fountain show at the Bellagio and then headed back to our hotel very tired and sweaty. Both of our best sleeps on the trip were in that hotel, it was the best part of Las Vegas. I'd say it was good to see Vegas once but it's not somewhere I need to go again. I thought it would be a lot more impressive and having people at every block try to hand out "escort" cards to Chris was not very much fun.
This drive was probably the most boring of all of them. The desert wasn't as interesting to look at as on the way to the Grand Canyon but once we got closer to Yosemite we had some fun on some mini roller coaster hills. Driving on the Tioga pass through Yosemite was great, we had our first look at the amazing rocks and boulders that Yosemite is so well known for. We only had a campsite booked for one night so the next morning we headed to the first come first serve site down a long narrow road and ended up finding a good little site. We quickly made some breakfast and then headed past the valley to our hiking spots at Taft Point and Sentinel Dome. This was a good little 3 hour hike on the big granite rock hills with great views of El Capitan (a big rock climbing face) and Half Dome (the most prominent rock in Yosemite). We had a great time taking in the views of Yosemite on that hike. We then drove a little farther to a lookout that the non-hikers go to to get a closer look at Half Dome. On our way to the valley we stopped by the river and scrubbed off the sweat and dirt from our hike. We had some tasty pizza in the valley and then went to check out the lower and upper Yosemite falls. These falls are the largest in North America but don't have a lot of water in them in July. Then we got a little frustrated trying to find our way back to the car to make it in time to see a sunset. We just got the tail end of a sunset that I had really wanted to see at Tunnel View. We tried to pack too much into one day so I guess we'll just have to go back one day so I can see my whole sunset.
Our drive from Yosemite to Salem, Oregon took about 12 hours but we wanted to not have too long of a drive home the next day. Chris got to see an area of Oregon where they harvest grass seed so he was pretty excited about that. We made a quick stop at the outlets on the way home and of course Chris found stuff but I didn't and we were home by around 4pm. Got a lot of loads of laundry started and it was good to be back in my own bed. It was an amazing trip and we hope to see some of those places again, probably just not on another big road trip like this. Now onto Saskatchewan in a week!
