The Pacific North West

15.7.00

And they're off .... So here's the plan we had - get in the car, drive north till we arrive in Seattle, see Dave and Ann and then turn around and come back. In between, check out "The Pacific Northwest", i.e. Oregon and Washington states and the parts of Northern California we hadn't yet been to. We decided to go for a combination of hotels, guest houses and camping. Camping in the US is pretty basic so we figured we'd go for camping every other day so we didn't smell too bad :-)

Anyway, back to today, it's Saturday and we've got up early to start driving. In a panic attack last night we booked a hotel in Ashland, just over the border in Oregon for the night so that we could be sure we had somewhere to stay. In the end this turned out to be a great move since it took away lots of the stress of looking for somewhere and allowed us to crunch some serious miles !

Our route was extremely simple for this first day - just drive north a little and get onto the I5 which goes all the way from LA to Seattle, passing about 50 miles East of San Jose as it does so.

The two stops on route to Ashland were Shasta dam and Mount Shasta, both still in California.  The dam was spectacular, particularly as you could drive over the top of it and see the valley on one side and the lake on the other !

The other stop was at Mount Shasta. This is a beautiful snow capped mountain near the Northern boarder of California. The tow on Shasta has a few small coffee shops and restaurants and we indulged in a Cappuccino or two before driving as far as the winding road would take us. 

The view was great and we took loads of photos. 

We got about half way back down before we realized we'd left out hats and the camera on a rock back at the top so we got to see it all over again !

Finally we arrived in Ashland, just over the boarder, and were stunned - culture ! After a few months in San Jose you forget what it's like to be in a normal town where people have real jobs, live regular lives and enjoy things like eating, drinking and the arts (as opposed to simply making money!). Anyway, Ashland was lovely. Many years ago a local academic started putting on some Shakespeare plays with his students. Well, not its turned into the town's major claim to fame and every summer they run a huge Shakespeare festival. We found a lovely brew-pub and had dinner watching the sun set before turning in for the night. I think I'm going to like this holiday !

16.7.00

The Unknown .... We got up bright and early and headed off into the unknown. Literally actually because we had no plan, no bookings nothing, just the aim of arriving in Seattle for the weekend. Stopping at some waterfalls we experimented with slow shutter speeds with mixed results ....

Our first stop today was Crater Lake. This, as you might expect, is a lake in a crater. However, such a description completely fails to capture the beauty of the place. When tourists first sent in their snaps of the lake to Kodak to be developed the company sent the photos back with a note apologizing for not getting the colors right, observing that water in nature simply isn't that blue. Well, at Crater Lake it is !

       

   

Leaving Crater Lake we headed off for lunch just past Diamond Lake Junction in a real diner - the first one I'd been in that didn't look like it had been made in the last few years. Everyone serving was about 85 stone and clearly enjoyed their work :-) In fact the food was great the portions simply huge. Wonderful.

We then drove on and after a brief sojourn in the three sisters wilderness area (named after a group of three striking mountains) we ended up in a camp site near the town of Sisters in the middle of the Deschutes National Forest. This is a small town that is clearly surviving by turning itself into a kind of up market antiques stop for the RV community. None of these luxuries for us, we camped in a site just west of the town and, having pitched the tent, we headed off into town for a meal. And here was the surprise, in the middle of this small one road town we found an absolutely wonderful Thai restaurant. 

I can't heap enough praise on the food here and as we ate, the evening developed into one of the best sunsets I've seen in many years. 

Home to our tent and the gentle sound of animals killing each other in the forest. 

17.7.00

Morning has broken .... and I stuck my head out of the tent to come face to face with a deer trying to come in. They really do nature on a whole different scale here. After a breakfast in Sisters we headed off for a mornings hiking in Silver Falls State Park. This is a huge park famous for, would you believe, waterfalls. A perfect excuse to combine hiking with taking loads of photos - almost all of which turned out terribly I'm afraid to say. Still, here's a couple that are passable.

After the hike we headed into Portland. This is a really nice town where a couple of guys from Lancaster ended up - in fact Rodger lived here for a while. It feels very homely and we enjoyed strolling around. We then drove out of town and ended up at Cannon Beach - an unbelievably touristy town on the coast but with a breathtaking stretch of beach. Jayne found us a B&B to stay in and we collapsed happily into a bath. Then headed out for dinner at a local brew pub. A long day.

18.7.00

Tired .... after yesterday's exploits we lay in this morning before going down to the beach and exploring.

   

   

And guess what we found - not one, not two, but three kite shops. Heaven. While some of them were a bit posh one was excellent, run by a Dead head and called the Kite Factory. Of course I had to buy a kite and a couple of new lines to fly with :-)

After lunch, still in Cannon Beach, we headed north on the 101, drifting through Aberdeen, which as a depressing logging town, and into the Olympic Peninsula. This is the home to the Olympic National Forest and a huge state park including a temperate rain forest.

Tonight was a camping night and we ended up in a great site near Kalaloch. The only things here are a "lodge", i.e. a few rooms, a bar and restaurant and a small shop and really a lot of trees. Feeling good in our camp site, from which we could stroll down onto the beach, we brought some firewood and had toasted marshmallows by our tent. The only downside to this was a visit by Ricky the Raccoon who wanted to have some of our food!  

It's worth saying here that the beach at Kalaloch is amazing. Being a logging area the beach is populated by hundreds of bleached white skeletons of trees, washed up by the tide. Some have been shaped by people into shelters but many others just lie at angles on the beach. 

19.7.00

Hurricane Ridge Having survived a night with Ricky we packed up the tent and headed for Hurricane Ridge, within the Olympic National Park and a supposedly great place to hike. On the way, we took in the Rain Forest in the Olympic National Park. This was kinda cool, but not that cool :-(

However,  Hurricane Ridge really was cool. Your drive for miles up the mountain and at the top there are some really nice hikes. There are also lots of bears around and apparently we only just missed meeting one on the trial !

        

       

After this we decided to head further North and got a ferry across to Whidbey island and a small village called Langley. Well, I couldn't resist could I ? Turned into a bit of a nightmare actually - very difficult to find accommodation and we ended up in a very expensive and very weird B&B.

20.7.00

Canoeing .... so the only cool thing about the B&B was the fact that it was on it small lake and they had canoes available for use by residents. So, early morning Jayne and I went for a spin on the lake before jumping in the car and heading east. We ended high up in the mountains, at Silver Fir in the Mt. Baker wilderness area. After a quick stroll in the snow we lit a fire and cooked tea, right in the middle of bear country !

21.7.00

Northern Exposure .... ok so we had a bad night's sleep. It was cold and Jayne kept thinking there were animals about to invade the tent. Her natural reaction to these fears was to push me towards the doorway of the tent to act as a sort of barrier. This wasn't entirely compatible with a good night's sleep !

Still, in the morning we got up and drove to this wonderful shop/garage that was right out of Northern Exposure. It sold everything, and I mean everything, and we walked in the woman behind the counter was baking fresh Cinnamon Rolls and running an expresso machine. Wonderful.

After a drive we ended up in Vancouver, Canada. An afternoon seeing the sights and then a drive down to Seattle to meet Dave and Ann. 

22.7.00

Seattle. Went sight seeing today in Seattle with Dave and Ann. Cool. Actually, sight seeing (Pike place, Space Needle etc. ) was one part of it and eating drinking was the other - we went to the Seattle food festival. Ended up with a fantastic meal at a Lebanese restaurant. The most garlic I've ever eaten in my whole life and some great wine as well. Dave and Ann's apartment is way cool and it was nice to see them.

23.7.00

Driving.... took us a while but today we drove back from Seattle to San Jose - about 850 miles. Took about 16 hours but was pretty much ok. We shared the driving so it was only 4 lots of two hours each. Even got to stop in Ashland for tea :-)

At the end I have to say this was a really nice holiday - if a little tiring.