Onward to Oregon

10/8/21

Today was a long day of travel with us completing 7 hours of driving. We had a Plan A, B , and C for campsites since it is the weekend and we would be arriving late to the sites. Our first spot was completely full so we had to keep driving down to Cape Lookout State Park where we found plenty of space available. While we were setting up for dinner and camp Nick found a giant banana slug by his car so we named him Gerald, Gerry for short, and watched him for a while. We were all pretty tired after the trip so we went to bed pretty early.

Gerald, Gerry, the banana slug.

10/9/21

Today we had breakfast at The Fern and enjoyed some huge omelets! The waitress was extremely nice and accommodating for being so short on staff. The food was excellent and I highly recommend checking it out if you are ever in the area!

A huge chainsaw for the giant trees out here.

Where we went for breakfast/lunch.

We then went to the Tillamook creamery to explore the cheese world and for Molly and Alex to fangirl about one of their favorite kinds of cheese! I will say I am not a huge cheese fan but it was really fascinating to learn about the process and see the activity of the workers and machinery.

The machines at work.

Packaging the cheese.

Quality inspection.

After Tillamook we drove the rest of the way to Portland to explore the city for the evening. We went to Powell's City of Books, which is the largest independent bookstore in the world! There were 5 floors and 2 giant rooms per floor. The sections were crazy detailed and a good majority of the books were used. It was also fascinating being right downtown with windows on every side of the building.

Some random section of the store.

For dinner we decided to go to Jake's Famous Crawfish where we had a table outside to watch the nightlife. We definitely looked questionable after having not showered for a few days but they still gave us a table. Molly and I shared French Onion Soup and Chicken Penne. The Penne was excellent but I will say that I need to give the onion soup a little more time to be appreciated.

Jake's Famous Crawfish

A cool building on our walk back to the parking garage.

Later that evening a huge storm hit that made my van shake! At one point I heard a loud bang and looked outside to see that our cooler had been knocked over by the wind and everything was strewn about the ground. I got out to clean up and the sound had woken Molly up too so she came out to help me as well. It was quite comedic being in the freezing rain cleaning up a bunch of wet food. I was more frustrated and grumbling to myself but Molly was laughing and enjoying the funny situation which in turn helped me relax and appreciate the humor of it all. Thankfully we got it cleaned up fairly quickly.

10/10/21

Today was our drive from outside of Portland, OR to Bend, OR. It was in total a 4 hour drive but we had a few stops in mind along the way. First we went to a Dutch Bros coffee, which I had never been to before, and enjoyed the great tasting drinks. Then we stopped at Multnomah Falls along the interstate, which my dad had highly recommended. It was a super cool spot in the middle of the interstate and there was a hotel that people could stay at right next to the falls. There was a huge waterfall that pooled and then cascaded into another pool underneath a bridge that had been built. There was construction on the path up to the top of the falls so we couldn't go past the bridge but it was still a beautiful spot. We stayed there soaking it in until a rainstorm started approaching. We got caught in the first bit of the storm before making it to our cars so we were all decently soaked. We then made the final push to our AirBnB about 20 minutes south of Bend and it blew us away how nice it was! There was a full kitchen with a nice big table to eat at and a HUGE couch! We all were pretty tired so we fell asleep pretty quickly after arriving.

Molly at Dutch Bros Coffee.

Multnomah Falls

Chaco views

10/11/21

Today we left the AirBnB to explore Bend. We originally were going to try and do a hike or go to Crater Lake but we were all pretty tired from the drive yesterday and didn't feel like driving too much again. So we found a really cool Burrito restaurant and then went to the last Blockbuster in the entire world! They had a decent amount of merchandise but it was still operating as a movie rental place. I guess people are donating money to keep it open and they had some cool donations from Russel Crowe in the actual store. We all then went grocery shopping and made it back to the AirBnB to rest and enjoy some down time. We continued watching the Twilight series since Nick was a huge fan. I was quite thankful for the opportunity to be with these people in this amazing place and couldn't wait for out plan to go climbing at Smith Rock tomorrow!

BLOCKBUSTER

Russel Crowe's costume from Les Miserables

Old VHS stuff

10/12/21

This day was an amazing day for everyone! I was super excited because we were going climbing at Smith Rock outside of Bend, OR. Smith Rock is known as the birthplace of climbing in the U.S. It was amazing being at this historical site with people that I love hanging out with. Molly, Alex, and Amos have their own climbing shoes so all I had to provide was an extra harness and safety instructions. We found a fun route called Night Flight which is a 5.5 easy route, the scale goes up to 5.15d. I gave instruction again on safety and communication while climbing and then Alex lead-belayed me as I set up the route. Then I belayed Alex and explained to Molly and Amos what I was doing and then Molly belayed Amos. I was a little intense in trying to coach Molly through everything and we both knew that Amos was a little nervous since he is not a huge fan of heights. It also was chaotic because he was moving so fast up the wall. All was well and Molly did a fantastic job dealing with the stress of me overexplaining and the anxiety of knowing that Amos was nervous. Then out of nowhere Nick said that he wanted to try the route. This was coming from a guy who is terrified of heights and doesn't even climb up ladders! I said if he wanted to try it then he should do it. So I gave him my nicer harness and he used Amos's shoes and then he started climbing the route! He moved a lot faster that I thought he would and didn't seem too scared while he climbed. We all coached him through the harder spots along the route and before we knew it he was at the top! The hard part was getting him back down because he was very hesitant to trust the harness and sit back in it. So the process was slow as we climbed back down but he made it to the ground and had the biggest grin on his face! I was super proud to be a part of him overcoming that fear of heights and pushing himself to achieve something he never thought possible! We all were proud of ourselves and I was exceptionally proud to be a part of everyone challenging themselves physically, mentally, and emotionally. It was a fantastic day that I am super grateful for.