Travel Log Continued

Though Seattle is a great vacation destination, there really was purpose to go to Seattle. A wedding! Carissa and Robert tied the knot on Saturday July 9th. Carissa being born on her grandpa's birthday, chose to be married on her grandparents wedding anniversary!

There was the usual pre-wedding activities, lots of food, and family times, laughter, great conversations and just hanging as a great big extended family, and as most families, from all parts of the Country!

Chuck and Chris's were the greatest the host and hostess and their lovely home perched on a hill overlooking part of Puget Sound and Vashon island, gave the perfect setting to pass the time, gazing at the ferries crossing back and forth across the water. It was mesmerizing!

And of course the paint brushes had to come out!

A little jogging fun! A little photog fun! And even some street fair fun!

Travel Log Day 2

July 7

Don't you just love logging trucks! ('...if you need logs over there, and you need logs over here?....)

Oregon morning, the fragrance of trees and clear air, and ruggedness. It was quiet this morning as we left Roseberg and pointed our car North. North, The Northwest, unique in it's appeal. The magnitude of trees, fir, and cedar, oaks, and poplars, giant towering pines line the highway as sentinels as we drive. The highway leads us over creeks and rivers, wide and small, it cuts through mountains and across the grassy flat lands. Green, unending varieties of green, and blue sky, a few white innocent clouds, the landscape continues to change as the hills begin to drop away to more open plains. We pass through the popular towns quickly, Albany, Eugene, Salem, so different than the elongated state of California. And finally, my home town, Portland; the great Willamette River meets the greater Columbia river, a port town, though miles from the Pacific Ocean, ships of all sizes lining the banks, only to be out done by the numerous bridges and tall skyscrapers.

Today it is well known for being 'green', and eco-friendly; the top city in the nation for bicyclists, (really? Don't you know it rains 360 days a year!) But I sense the pull of roots here. I haven't lived here in over 40 years, yet I feel it, the 'I know this place', but, I really don't. This is not the town where my memories of childhood rest or where my grandparents lived; with the commotion of cars and people everywhere. My memories of this town are of a by-gone era, of playing outside until dark, running the streets with neighbor kids, of the basement and horse corrals, the braying of Henrietta and an apple orchard! Wait! I love it!

We have to wait for a 'lift' bridge!

So cool! Over the bridge and into Washington, Seattle here we come!
We arrived in Seattle, blue sky and fluffy white clouds! The Seattle skyline! Beautiful! Such a gorgeous city.

( okay it was over cast the first day, but it was still incredible! Writers license!) Found our hotel, after driving in circles and then off to Chuck and Chris's! I've not been in west Seattle, and it IS actually west of Seattle proper! So, ok, I think I could live in their house, at least in their basement! A view!

Incredible, over looking Vashon Island and the ferry terminal below, mesmerizing to sit on the deck and watch the ferry's and barges going by. Fortunately, we had water view places at the dinning room table!

A full day, good driving time, left Roseberg about 9 am and checked into our hotel a little before 3pm. And the gas prices for the day and a half trip? A little more than my grandparents, $59.24, more like $157.02! and our hotel room? Not $8.00, but $134.02. Does it count if that includes a full breakfast?

(sorry can't figure out how to rotate the photo!)

(side side note...one of the extras is 'Disneyland' $5.00!!!!!!)

Travel log

July 6, 2011



TRAVEL LOG

Carrisa and Robert's wedding


Bakersfield to Seattle

Last minute packing. Always seems to be one more thing I want to put in my suitcase. Recalling from the many trips I have journeyed the corridor of highway 5 or on more leisurely trips highway 101, memories float unconnected through my mind keeping me from sleep. My grandmother made this trip many times in her life, some with my grandfather, other trips made as a widow, some
and in later years by jet airplanes or motorhome or by train in the accompaniment of my mom and step dad. An unusual accomplishment for a woman born in 1903 and never drove a car in her 92 years. She loved to travel. And at times she kept a journal. I have two of her travel logs. logging the mundane items of travel, what time they left, how many miles, what she and my grandfather ate, what city or town they paid for a motel to spend the night. Her notes show on one trip to Altadena from Cannon Beach, Oregon, fuel costs, with an oil change, $59.24; a hotel stay in Garberville was $8.00 plus $.25 for the jute box! I think they were enjoying themselves.

Never without words to describe the sites around the
country as she traveled or the people she met, I smile as I read her words.
So I am inspired to 'log' my travel...
With my mind restless and unable to quiet itself for sleep, I went to the kitchen for the token cup of hokt chocolate. Sitting in the dark sipping my sweet drink, finally sleep won over. A few hours of sleep before the alarm sounded at 4am. Road trip! The rewards for early morning travel.

Fields of sunflowers, no pictures taken because I am driving. Great white cranes flying in formation
The slight change in terrain, flat desert, to unending rolling hills only broken by olive gray oak trees. 
Shasta Lake is full from the heavy snow melt of spring and summer and majestic Mt Shasta, wearing its garment of snow.

Each town we speed through seems to have it's own charm and beckons the wanderer within me to stop and mosey around. Each draws my comment, 'I could live here.'

It is Roseberg, we decide, where we will spend the night. Utterly unbelievable as we travel d own the highway, I am able to search hotels in Roseberg and make a reservation for our night's stay, all without a phone call or having to pull off and find a pay phone, or even worse driving to a hotel to find a no vacancy. Twelve hours later we pull into the quaint town, nestled against the hills and check into our hotel room. We enjoyed dinner from a local bar and grill; mine, salmon with pomegranate glaze, rice pilaf, with dried cranberries, summer vegetables! Yum! Duane ordered filet with crab and asparagus spears and salad, with, 'to lick the container clean', gorgonzola dressing!
A glass of wine on the balcony overlooking the Umpqua river, and a swim in the pool to finish out the day!

I wonder if my grandparents even had air conditioning in their truck...I highly doubt it.