We started out Thursday evening. I drove from Boise to Richland to meet Joe, and we set off at around 5 PM. We were headed to a campground about 30 minutes past Portland, L.L. Stub Stewart State Park. We'd never been there before, but had reserved a cabin for the night. We ended up getting there pretty late after a harrowing drive through downtown Portland. Having never been to this campground before, we didn't really know where we were going. The turn off lead us on a pitch-black dark and windy road up some mountains. My patience was wearing very thin as I'd been in the car about nine hours at this point. Thankfully, we eventually found the campground and were pleased to find a really nice, brand new cabin waiting for us. We had no idea what the land around us even looked like because it was so dark.
When we woke up the next morning, we were greeted by a beautiful view!
You can see a bit of the cabin behind Cedar here:
The air was crisp and it was a gorgeous, sunny day so we decided to go on a hike.
Cedar, as always, was rarin' to go.
It really is a gorgeous place; I'd love to go back and spend more time there. There are miles of trails and the campground is brand new and well set-up.
There are tons of wildflowers, too.
Part of the trail was dark and densely covered with vegetation. It was very cool!
We couldn't move fast enough for Cedar, and she got annoyed with us :)
A makeup-less photo of me and Cedar in the "jungle" :)
She was not impressed by all of the photo ops.
One of Joe and Cedar:
Another one of Cedar and I (don't mind my pale freaky alien legs and Cedar's awkward pose... it's a very true-to-life portrait of us.):
Around noon, we left the park and drove to Astoria, OR... with a stop in Seaside for lunch. We've always wanted to go to Astoria to see the Goonies house. So we did! I'll spare you the pictures of me by the house, as it looks like I'm not wearing any pants. Should have double checked the length ratio of shorts-to-hoodie before the photo op. Damn. But here's one of the house...
And here's one of Joe standing in front of it ;)
Astoria sure is a beautiful town!
After our pilgrimage to the Goonies house, we drove down the coast to Newport along the coastal highway.
I love Newport! It's my favorite town on the OR coast, and probably one of my favorite places in the world. I'd love to live there someday.
Of course, the first thing we did was go to the beach :)
...and yup, posed Cedar for another picture. Go figure.
Cedar was not too excited about the waves at first. Note her worried expression.
As soon as we brought out the Chuck-it, she forgot all about that, though. Cedar LOVES to play fetch on the beach :)
Man, I love the beach.
So does Joe.
And Cedar.
If you look closely in this picture, you can see a boat in the distance :)
Look, now Cedar's posed on a log!
...and then I got the brilliant idea to have her jump over it.
Maybe this posing thing ain't so bad... when there's fetching and sand involved.
After reluctantly leaving Newport on Sunday, we stopped at Multnomah Falls for dinner on the way back to Richland. A perfect ending to a perfect vacation! I can't wait to go back.
