Hey Guys!! We stayed in the Portland area for two weeks and we tried to squish as much as we could into those two weeks. We didn’t see everything on our list…but we came close.
Most of the time we spent in this area was smoky but we were lucky enough to have a couple of sun filled days to take in the views. We found a great overlook that gave us a nice view of Mount Hood. You can see the haze of smoke in the picture above.
Fort Vancouver was a British fur trading post built in 1824. The National Park Service has done an excellent job recreating Fort Vancouver. When I was looking it up online, I wasn’t sure if it was going to be much more than a partial fence and a building or two…it was really hard to tell online.
There was a volunteer manning the blacksmith building. If you ever really want to get a feel for what life was like while you’re at one of these forts…talk to the volunteers. The volunteers that choose to spend their time teaching the public about what life was like during certain areas or times are some of the most knowledgeable and passionate people we’ve met. We got to see what it took to make just one nail while we were in the blacksmith shop. He talked to us about how anytime the people in the fort needed anything they had to make it themselves. Want a house…better start making nails. Some of the blacksmiths back then could make 100s of nails an hour. The best ones could make 1000s of nails per hour. It took our volunteer a few minutes to make one. The blacksmith was one of the most important people in any settlement and usually made the most money.
The other building that had volunteers present the day we went was the carpenter’s building. They were making some chairs while we were there.
Due to the lack of funding right now, there was only one Ranger on site and just a handful of volunteers so several of the buildings were locked up. One of the volunteers offered to show us the fur trading building where the area’s settlers would bring in their furs to get money or trade for other items. The biggest money maker was the beaver fur that the top hats were made of. Any respecting gentleman had a top hat made of beaver fur. They would bring the furs in all bundled up in 50 pound packs like the ones in the above left picture. The furs were inspected and weighed before a price was agreed upon.
There was a separate trading building for the Native Americans of the area. One family at a time was let into the fort to trade. When one family left another was let in.
I loved the garden at the fort! Look at all of those pretties! Y’all know my love affair with pretties. I can’t tell you how many pics of different flowers I took…probably more than what was necessary. Ha! The garden was full of life. Bees buzzing around…birds flitting about…I do love a good garden.
Pearson Air Museum is in the same area as Fort Vancouver. I believe the two parks are run jointly. The museum is dedicated to preserving the aviation history of the area. There are some very cool planes and exhibits in an old hangar.
The museum also keeps the history of the old mill that used to be in the area. I love this mural of the lumber mill that helped supply the WWI construction of biplanes. This was a great little museum that had a surprising amount of history and information crammed in it. We could have spent several hours here, but we’d spent all morning at Fort Vancouver and some of us were starting to get a little…hangry and needed food.
I knew there was a lot to do in the Portland area, but I really didn’t know just how much there would be to do! Maybe one day we’ll find ourselves back in the area.
Hey Guys! We spent two weeks in Troutdale, OR so we could check out Portland and see the Columbia River Gorge area.
We really enjoyed staying in Troutdale. It was a cute little town and was close to pretty much everything we wanted to check out in the area.
The RV park we stayed in was right by the river. On weekends it was crazy busy, but through the week it wasn’t too bad. There were tons of marionberry bushes all loaded with ripe berries down by the river and the boys would walk down with me to help pick some. They would eat a few then wander off to the river. Honestly, I think I ended up with more berries in the bowl without their help, but I appreciated the company. We enjoyed fresh marionberries daily while we stayed at this park! Yum!!
At a local food chain called Burgerville we found an amazing marionberry shake! It was so good!
My favorite thing about the location of this RV park was it’s proximity to the river and all of the available walking paths we had. We like to get out and walk around everyday. Some parks make this easier than others. At this one we could walk down by the river, then make our way over to the main street of Troutdale. We could easily spend more time in this area. Troutdale is the cutest little town with art dotted here and there down the main street. We made ourselves a walking loop we liked to do in the evenings. Down by the river then up to the main street and back. We’d get right around 2 miles in when it was all said and done.
Location, location, location. Our home-base for the area was right next to the Columbia River Gorge. The Columbia River Gorge is where the Columbia River makes its way through the area by cutting a path right into the Cascade mountains. If you drive the Historic Columbia River Highway, you’ll come across some amazing waterfalls! This one is a popular one called Multnomah Falls and it’s right off the highway. You don’t have to put in a long arduous hike to get to this one which makes it nice and quick to visit but also is probably why this place was absolutely packed when we got there one morning. We were lucky to find a parking spot! To get to the falls you have to walk in a tunnel that goes under the highway and then under a railroad track. A train went by while we were there…I have to admit that the crowd and the location of the highway/train kind of detracts from the beauty of the falls.
If you stay on the Historic Columbia River Highway you’ll come to the Portland Women’s Forum State Scenic Viewpoint. From the road, it doesn’t look like much. When we pulled in, there was one other car…and I think the guy was living out of his car and staying there over night. But, we pretty much had the place to ourselves to ogle the view. And what a view it was! In the picture above you can see the Vista House sitting up on the cliff over to the right of the picture. That’s where most people go and that’s where we were headed when we saw this little gem of a pull-off.
When we eventually got back in the car and headed to the Vista House, it was packed. There were so many people even though the Vista House was closed. We got there just before they officially closed. I barley had enough time to grab a couple of souvenirs. We hoped that everyone would leave after closing, but we definitely weren’t the only ones hanging around for the view. It is a great view, but I’ll be honest…I think I prefer the view from the Portland Women’s Forum State Scenic Viewpoint.
Now, y’all know we love our foodies. And y’all have probably heard how Portland, OR is a huge foodie town. One of the things we wanted to experience is the famed Portland food truck scene. There are several areas of Portland that have a big gathering of food trucks…they call them Food Cart Pods. We did a little research on what was where and landed at this pod. I don’t remember what it was called, but it had food options for everyone. Charles got some Asian, a couple of us got Polish food, Nicholas had Mexican, and then one of us had Salvadorian food! I expected it to be a fast food setup with everything disposable, but some places had actual plates that you return to them when you’re done. There were tables to sit at while we ate. We were very pleasantly surprised by our food pod experience. We tried to go to a different one while we were in the area, but it didn’t work out. We went on a Sunday and tons of the carts were closed and there wasn’t a place to sit down to eat…so we passed.
But Guys…Portland did not disappoint with the foodies. Not even a little. It’s probably a good thing we were only there for two weeks…there are so many foodie spots to try!
We squished quite a few adventures into the two short weeks we had in the Troutdale area so I’m going to break this area up into two posts. I’ll leave you with these two pretties that we saw on one of our evening walks.
Hey Guys! We spent one week in Salem, OR exploring the area.
When we left Central Point we were surrounded by wildfires. The RV park was filling with smoke, it was extremely hot and dry, and Guys…we were just so ready to head north to try and get away from it all. When we started out to our next spot, we headed up I-5 and the smoke started getting worse. We got a little worried it would get too thick to drive through, but as we got up out of the valley, the smoke cleared and it turned into a beautiful day.
One of the things we always love to see is what each state looks like…topography, agriculture, different architectural styles…sometimes it surprises us. Like Oregon. We saw so many huge hay fields. Hay as far as the eye could see! It was all mowed down and ready for harvesting, but it still looked really neat. And dry. It’s no wonder why Oregon is a fire hazard every summer.
The main reason we spent time in Salem was to visit the State Capitol Building. Right from the start, I liked this one. Most of the SCBs look something like the National one in DC so it’s nice when we find one that’s different. I wasn’t expecting a dome, but check this one out! I love the patriotic theme of it. The Oregon SCB wasn’t flashy and it wasn’t huge. It didn’t have every square inch covered in decoration but, there were some very nice murals and they used marble from all over the country. It was very tasteful and simplistic. What decorations there were all had meaning.
We added our Oregon sticker! The map is looking kind of full! It’ll be a month before we get to add the Idaho sticker as we start making our way south for the winter.
We heard about a Silver Falls State Park a few weeks before we got to the Salem area. It wasn’t too far from where we were staying so we went to check it out. The most popular trail there is the Trail of Ten Falls. It’s a ten mile trail that takes you by ten falls.
The day we went it was over 100 degrees. It was so so hot. With no breeze. We decided we’d check out two of the falls, but it was just too uncomfortable to try to do all ten miles. We did see some of the local wildlife. This guy wasn’t interested in us at all, he was trying to find place to cool off.
This area of Oregon was shaped by lava flows. Some geologists think there were around eight different lava flows layered up one on top of another in the Silver Falls SP area. Some layered up to as much as 600 feet thick. One of the coolest things about this SP is that the trail actually goes behind some of the waterfalls! Not only was it neat to walk behind a waterfall and look through it…the cooling mist coming off of the waterfall was very welcome. We might have lingered longer than necessary. Ha!
Foodies! Some friends of ours (waves at the McConnels) told us about a BBQ place in the area so we went to check it out. It was so good! Check out that tray full of food! Yum!
It’s getting harder to find pretties…this summer season has been so hot and dry the flowers are either all dried up or too far away to get a decent picture of.
We enjoyed the Salem area more than we thought we would! We would totally visit the area again…during cooler weather.
Hey Guys! We spent two hot and smoky weeks in Central Point, OR.
I was a little worried about this drive day. I’d heard that highway 199 between Central City, CA and Grant’s Pass, OR could be a bit of a white knuckler. Lots of narrow winding roads combined with steep grades. The thought of it kept me up the night before. It turned out to be…not so bad. There were spots of narrow winding roads…there were definitely some steep grades up and down…but, we’d been on worse roads and Jerl handled it like a pro.
I’d been preparing myself for a stressful drive day…I was prepared for it. What I wasn’t prepared for was how stinkin’ pretty the drive was! We followed this river for quite some time and the coloring of it was just…wow! I tried several times to get a good shot of it as we were navigating the road. It’s not the greatest shot, but you can get an idea of how pretty the area was.
The RV park we stayed in was in a great location and at an even better price. After three months of steep California prices we were ready to get back to some more reasonable rates.
The main thing we wanted to do while in Central Point was visit Crater Lake National Park. The day we went was a gorgeous day with an amazing blue sky and temps in the 80s. Check out the blue of that water! There’s an old Native American legend that says the blue bird was actually black until it took a dip into the water of Crater Lake. With a depth of 1,943 feet, Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the US and the seventh deepest lake in the world. It’s a combination of that depth and it’s source of water that gives the lake that incredible inky blue color.
The boys have vests and hats that they put all of their Junior Ranger badges on. They usually just wear them into the Visitor Center at each park to do the Rangering and then they take them off to do any exploring. It would totally stink to lose a badge somewhere. So, usually not too many people see them in their Rangering gear, but at Crater Lake we had to park farther away from the Visitor Center and the boys ended up wearing their gear down to one of the overlooks…and people kind of went nuts over it. I lost count of how many people wanted pictures of/with them or they wanted to just talk to them. The boys didn’t really know what to think of it all. They don’t do it for the attention or to grab more bling. They genuinely enjoy the learning.
Once we finished up with the Rangering we took off on Rim Drive. Rim Drive is around 38 miles and takes you all the way around Crater Lake.
Pumice Castle is 200 feet high and is the result of an eruption that took place 70,000 years ago.
The day we went to Crater Lake NP it was crazy busy. We figured we would end up eating in our car surrounded by other cars, but we ended up having an entire pull-off all to ourselves. We got out and sat on the wall and enjoyed a few minutes of quite solitude as we ate our picnic lunch. It was nice to get away from the crowds for awhile…and the view wasn’t bad either. ;-P
Phantom Ship is what remains of one of the mountain’s original cones…back around 400,000 years ago. From the view point on Rim Drive, Phantom Ship looks small, but it stands at an impressive 160 feet high. Can you see that teeny tiny why dot in between Phantom Ship and the edge of the caldera? That’s a real boat. If you look closely you can also see it in the big panorama picture earlier in the post. You can buy boat tickets to tour around the lake. We opted not to do the boat tour this time, but look forward to doing it next time.
If you’re looking for a nice day hike, you can walk all the way around the rim on the Rim Trail. We decided not to do this hike. We did walk a tiny bit of it while we were checking out some of the overlooks, but that’s it. We saw a few people who looked like they were going to try to do the whole hike, but it wasn’t our kind of hike. The trail was close to the road a lot and really…its pretty much the same view for the entire hike. A beautiful view…but the same view. If I’m going to go on a hike like that…it’s got to have a big payoff at the end in the form of a stellar vista or something.
Crater Lake was formed when the caldera of Mount Mazama filled in with rain and snow water. We’ll never know for sure what the 12,000 foot high volcano really looked like, but there are clues as to what features it held. When Mount Mazama exploded around 7,700 years ago it was forty-two times greater than the explosion of Mount St. Helen’s in 1980.
During our second week in Central Point there was a thunder storm and the lightening from that storm started a fire. (Top picture) We could see the smoke from our RV park. We watched it all week. Some days it seemed to be about out and other days it would roar back to life. It was far enough away that we weren’t too worried about it. And then we heard that a homeless person was trying to cook something with fire and it got away from them. (bottom left picture) It was close enough that we were worried about being able to escape if we needed to. The park was put on level two alert, but luckily this fire was put out by that evening. Between these two fires and a fire up north near the Grant’s Pass area…our park was filling with smoke and ash from all the fires started falling like snow on our RV park.
Before the valley filled with smoke, we were treated to some spectacular sunsets!
It was a busy two weeks. Along with exploring, we celebrated Charles’ birthday,
the boys started back to school,
and we celebrated our 21st anniversary!
We found some pretty tasty foodies during this stop! There was a cashew chicken noodle thing (left picture). Yup, that’s the actual name. Cashew Chicken Noodle Thing. Not really, but I can’t remember what it was called. It’s my new favorite Asian dish. It was so good everyone else “helped” me eat it. Wasn’t that nice of them?! Ha! I didn’t mind. The portions at this place were huge! We also found a really great little burger/brewery place. There’s a burger under that pile of jalapeno slaw…I promise. So far, we’ve been super impressed with the foodie finds in Oregon!
There weren’t very many pretties. It was full on summer and super hot and dry, but I did find this one pink pretty.
We didn’t do much exploring during these two weeks for various reasons…school, work, celebrations, smoke, heat… but we enjoyed the slower pace after four weeks of non-stop going.
Hey Guys!! We spent one very full week in Myers Flat trying to spend as much time among the tall trees as we could. Our RV park was actually on the Avenue of Giants road. There were some pretty nice sized redwoods right in our neighborhood that week.
The Avenue of the Giants is a 31 mile scenic drive through part of Humboldt Redwoods State Park. The huge trees line the road as you drive through one of the largest remaining old growth redwood forests in the world.
The coastal redwoods can live a loooong life. Some reach upwards of 2,000 years old. See the marker closest to Alex? That marks how big the tree was when the Viking’s discovered North America in the year 1000. The last one…was the year the California State Park system was established in the year 1928.
We saw some really big trees when we were in Sequoia National Park…we saw some tall trees while we were in Redwood National Park…but this tree was our first taste at just how incredibly tall the coastal redwoods can get. The Founders Tree stands at 346.1 feet tall and has a circumference of 12.7 feet.
Have you ever heard of an albino tree? No? We hadn’t either, but in one of the brochures I picked up there was a mention of albino redwoods hidden somewhere within the many groves of redwoods along the Avenue of Giants. We asked around and actually managed to lay eyes on one. An albino tree has to grow off of another tree. Don’t feel bad if you didn’t spot it on the picture on the left, they’re kind of hard to see. This one was growing almost two hundred feet off the ground out of the side of another redwood. We looked for others as we explored, but we never found another one.
Redwoods can grow to weigh more than 500 tons and reach a height taller than the Statue of Liberty, but their root systems are amazingly shallow…which is why most of them die from toppling over from either wind or to much water from storms. I think we might have seen just as many redwoods lying down as there were standing tall.
The Dyerville Giant once stood an astonishing 370 feet high. Guys, that’s 200 feet taller than the Niagara Falls! This tree was considered the tallest tree in the world until it fell in 1991 as another tree fell into it during a storm. The Dyerville Giant was so big that when it fell it shook the ground hard enough for a nearby seismograph to pick up the tremors. We walked the length of it a couple of times marveling at the sheer size of it. In the upper right picture, you can see the hole the Dyerville left in the canopy when it fell. While standing, the Giant had a crown spread of seventy-four feet.
A redwood’s trunk can grow up to twenty-two feet in diameter with a bark that can be more than twelve inches thick.
The Big Tree area of Humboldt Redwoods State Park is in the Rockefeller Forest section. Some of the trees in the Rockefeller Forest are close to 2,000 years old.
This is Tall Tree. It stands at 359.3 feet with a circumference of 42 feet. It’s big. I took way more pictures of trees in this one week than I’ve ever taken in my life. Trees. It’s hard to explain why these titan trees fascinate us so much. There’s something about standing next to a living thing that’s been in the world for so long…
We did other things too. We found a great little zoo in Eureka. Nicholas just told you all about that though, so I won’t go into it. I will say, that the red panda exhibit was the best we’ve seen yet!
We found a great little pizza place in Miranda, CA…right down the road from where we stayed.
Well, I could ramble on forever about tall trees. I took enough pictures of them to fill several posts. If I ever talk Jerl into going back to California it will be to see the tall trees.
Hey Guys!! We spent one week in Myers Flat so we could spend some more time amongst the tall trees we’ve come to love so much.
When we got to our RV park we realized that the Verizon service they’d promised on the phone wasn’t there. I couldn’t even pull up Facebook on my phone and Jerl had a real bugger of a time trying to work. If we’d been planning on staying for more than a week we would have had to find a place with better connectivity and move.
Redwood National and State Parks are home to the world’s tallest trees. The two parks protect almost half of the remaining old growth redwoods left in the world. We spent some time in the midst of the giant sequoia trees earlier this year while we were in Sequoia National Park and completely fell in love with tall trees. The first full day we had in the area we went to Redwood National and State Parks. We started in the National Park with the Lady Bird Johnson Grove trail where we spent some time tripping on things in the trail because our necks were craned back looking up at the tall trees.
The coastal redwood is the tallest living thing on earth. It’s hard to believe that something so big can grow from something the size of a tomato seed.
There’s a good sized herd of Roosevelt Elk in the area. We’ve seen a lot of warning signs in our travels, but this was the first time we’ve seen a sign like this. Don’t mess with the mamas. They will hoof you.
Fern Canyon. You might recognize it from Jurassic Park II. I can’t remember where I first heard about Fern Canyon, but I knew right away it was a spot I really wanted to see. In all of the pics I saw of the one mile gorge, there were little bridges over all of the water crossings…but when we got there…there weren’t any bridges. None. Plenty of water in the little creek that runs through the gorge though! At first we tried to keep our shoes dry by walking on strategically placed rocks and logs.
It wasn’t long before we realized we were going to get wet so we rolled up our pant legs and waded through the water. We had the best time! Fern Canyon has fifty foot walls that are draped with seven different kinds of ferns. When you’re walking through it, it’s easy to imagine huge dinosaurs rambling through the canyon munching on all of the ferns.
When we know that we’re going to be out all day exploring in remote areas we like to pack a picnic lunch. Most times we end up eating in our car somewhere, but check out the view we had at this picnic! Not bad, right? It was a gorgeous day for a picnic by the ocean.
On the way home we stopped at Patrick’s Point State Park. We walked the trail out to Wedding Rock. The view was pretty amazing. And check out that black rock! We’d seen some black sand beaches around…I guess we know where the black sand comes from.
We also walked out to Agate Beach. We were told you can find agates there. We picked up some rocks, but I really don’t know if they’re actually agates. It doesn’t matter though…we love them. It’s hard to tell in this picture, but the sand was a black-ish sand.
So, I’ve only told you about one day of the week that we spent in Myers Flat. Instead of making one really long post, I’m going to break this week up into two posts. We found the pink flower in the Lady Bird Johnson Grove. There were several trees with the blooms on them throughout the trail. Bright pops of pink in a sea of green. It was pretty magical.
Hey Guys! Remember when we had to change all of our plans because of engine trouble and eye surgery? Bodega Bay wasn’t originally in our plans, but when I was reworking our schedule I added it in on a whim. It’s just north of San Francisco and I don’t usually have such small travel jumps, but something about the area called to me…so I answered.
Bodega Bay is, as you might guess…right on the water. It’s kind of a white knuckley drive down highway one to get there, but Guys, we loved the area! The RV park we stayed in was near enough to the coast that we could hear the boats and water, but far enough that we were somewhat protected from the wind that seems to be a constant on the west coast.
We only had one week in Bodega Bay. That means we really only had one full day of exploration. We started out early in the morning and headed down to Point Reyes National Seashore. When we took off that morning it was a gorgeously sunny day with just a few specs of clouds but as we drove south to Point Reyes NS the clouds and fog started creeping in.
By the time we made it to Point Reyes it was sooo foggy and windy!! We tried to go out to the Point Reyes Lighthouse, but Guys…it was so incredibly windy and foggy we could barely see the road that you have to walk up to get to the lighthouse. We talked to the Ranger sitting in his car up at the lighthouse gate (it was bad enough that even he didn’t want to get out of his car) and he let us know that the lighthouse was open, but it was about a half mile walk to get to it. We opted out. As much as we love lighthouses…it was just too windy, wet, and cold. We did stop at Drake’s Beach! Love those cliffs!
I always try to give you a size comparison. Here’s a shot of the boys standing next to those cliffs on Drake’s Beach. With the weather being kind of…miserable…we didn’t have to share the beach with too many people. I mean, really, what kind of a nutter goes to the beach when it’s in the 40s and is super windy with fog? Well, the nomad nutters do. Yup. When you have a set time at a location, you go explore no matter what the weather (within reason) does or you miss out.
We found several sand dollars, a few shells, and some tide pools! They weren’t big tide pools, but we did enjoy the little sea anemones in them.
While I prefer to have beautiful sunny days to explore, I have to admit…I’m kind of digging the moodiness that the fog gave my pictures of Drake’s Beach. I guess it’s ok to have mood…sometimes.
The weather was so miserable that day we almost gave up on adventuring and went home. I’m so glad we stuck it out and headed up to Fort Ross State Historic Park which was about an hours drive north of where we were staying. We got there later in the day and only had about an hour to explore it. We do love our forts. It’s not unusual for us to get lost in a fort for half a day or more. So, we really had to rush through this one.
Fort Ross was established in 1812 for the primary purpose of finding food and hunting sea otters for their furs to support the Russian outposts in Alaska. Some of the buildings have been reconstructed and decorated to look close to what they would have looked like during the time the fort was up and running. There’s so much history that can be learned at forts like this. Most of what we’ve learned by visiting all of these forts isn’t taught in the general history books, but history is an important lesson.
On our way home from our foggy day of exploration we stopped at this pull-off to take in the view of the spot where the Russian River dumps into the pacific ocean. We noticed a crowd of people down on the beach all ogling a particular spot on the beach in between us. Guys! Seals! There was a ton of them! We found out later that the beach is called Goat Rock Beach and apparently, the seals are there often.
This is another shot of Goat Rock Beach on a different day. We tried to get out each afternoon during our week in the Bodega Bay area to get some more exploring done.
There are tons of pull-offs to take in the amazing views all along this section of highway one. We spent most of the afternoons at one of the pull-offs or beaches in the Sonoma Coast State Park. We loved our week along this rugged coast. I don’t think any of us were really ready to move on.
Let’s talk foodies. Right in front of where we stayed was this great little Mexican restaurant. We stopped in our first night and kind of wished we hadn’t. It was really good and way too close…we walked there. We also found a place right on the wharf where we got some great fish-n-chips! We’re getting our fill of all of the coastal fish-n-chips while we can.
I started seeing these in the supermarkets when we were in San Diego, but I kept resisting. We found them for sale singely at a little market in Bodega Bay though…so we tried them. Guys…do you see the two oatmeal cookies? These were so wrong that they were so right. I thought I’d be safe enough…we only had one more week in California at this point. I was really hoping I wouldn’t be able to find them once we got out of California…but, we’re in Oregon right now and…I saw them in the grocery store here! I may have to grab a box before we leave…I’m trying to be strong…but y’all know I’m a sugarholic… The struggle is real.
I love love love these pink and purple pretties! We found these at Fort Ross.
Hey Guys!! We stayed in the Vacaville area for two weeks while we explored the San Francisco area.
Vacaville was about forty-five minutes away from San Francisco so it really suited us well. Far enough away to avoid the crush of so many people on a daily basis, but close enough that we were able to spend two days explore San Francisco.
We passed by this field every time we went toward the Bay area. Do you see the little outhouse? It’s quite the outhouse! Complete with modern plumbing…but no door…and facing a highway. Oh the things we see…
Y’all know that big cities aren’t really our thing. In fact, we usually skip them, but I wanted to see the big red bridge. Our first day in San Francisco was on a weekend and boy let me tell you…the crowds were insane! It took us quite a bit of time to find a parking space anywhere near the bridge, but we eventually did. It was cold and super windy. Apparently, that’s a typical summer day for San Francisco. By the time we walked to the bridge that famous San Francisco Bay fog had started rolling in.
We waded through the crowds to snap some pictures of the view then hightailed it back to the warmth of our car. This was as close as we got to Alcatraz. Timing and tickets weren’t on our side this trip. I’m hoping to revisit the area someday, but like I said before…big cities aren’t really our thing…so, we’ll see. We made our way down to Fisherman’s Wharf to do some more sight seeing, but the crowds were just too thick for us so we decided to leave.
We headed out in search of food and found ourselves at a place called Roam. Do you see that burger in the picture? I somehow got my mouth around it (no comments please) and promptly realized that this burger was definitely on my list of top five burgers…near the top. We got the Fry-Fecta to go along with our burgers. My favorite of the three choices was the fried zucchini/onion spirals. We left reminiscing about all of the other burgers we’ve had while trying to decide which burger is on the top of our list of favorites. We all agreed it was a green chili cheeseburger, but we’re divided as to exactly which one.
By the time we were crossing back over the bridge to head home the fog had rolled fully in. It was a little eerie crossing over the water without being able to see it.
Our second excursion into the city was during the week. We made the trip first thing in the morning to avoid as much of the crowd as we could. We found Fisherman’s Wharf much less crowded. And Guys, check out the famous San Francisco hills. It’s hard to really see how steep it is in pictures…you can see the slope of it better in the bottom picture. Driving up one of the steeper hills felt kind of like the beginning of a roller-coaster. You know…the very beginning when you’re click, click, clicking slowly to the top of the hill so you can plummet down the other side. I feel like it would definitely be more terrifying to go plummeting down one of these steep San Francisco hills.
Our first stop was the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park where we learned about the city’s seafaring past. There’s a nice little museum at the Visitor’s Center where the boys got their Junior Ranger booklets, but the best part is right across the street, over at the Hyde St. Pier where you can walk around and explore some older ships.
We walked around an old passenger ferry named Eureka. Eureka started out as a ship named Ukiah that used to transport munition filled railroad cars. We loved walking through all of the old cars and the upper level where the passengers would ride.
Years ago…I don’t remember where I first got some…I had my first taste of See’s Candies. It’s been my favorite boxed chocolate since then. So, when we saw a See’s Candies store on Fisherman’s Wharf…I had to go in. And…come out with a few…souvenirs.
We ended up at a fish-n-chips place called The Codmother Fish & Chips. There’s something about having fish just feet from the water it was caught in…so good!
Our last stop in San Francisco was the Sutro Baths. At one time, the Sutro Baths were once the world’s largest indoor swimming complex. The building itself is all but gone, but there are still remnants of what once was. This picture of what the Sutro Baths used to look like was in the Visitor Center. Adolph Sutro, a German immigrant, used the money he made as an engineer of a ventilation tunnel for the silver mines of Nevada’s Comstock Lode to purchase the real estate called Lands End and build the Sutro Baths. The swimming and bathing complex was covered in three acres of stained glass and steel and seemed to be built right into the seaside cliffs.
Confession…I’m a little bit of a sugarholic. Just a little. Well, if I’m being completely honest, I might as well tell you…I’m a huge sugarholic. Huge! Some of my friends and family have told me that sugar runs through my veins instead of blood. While I’ve made an effort to cut back on the amount of sugar I have a day…er…I mean a week. We couldn’t pass up touring through the factory of one of my favorite sugary treats. Jelly Belly!
The Goelitz family has been in the candy business since 1869. That’s a lot of candy making! At the Fairfield factory, you can take a free self-guided tour of their candy making process and see the factory in action. In the picture above you can see what Jelly Belly bean centers look like. When the centers get their shells, they’ll be 40% bigger! The center bean of a Jelly Belly is made from a slurry made of sugar, water, corn syrup, and corn starch. Every Jelly Belly bean starts with the same basic slurry and then the flavor and color is added. The Fairfield Jelly Belly factory can make around 800 Jelly Belly bean centers per second. Once the bean centers have been made they have to cure, rest and dry.
Have you ever wondered how they mix the Jelly Belly beans for the bags of mixed flavors? They pour boxes of each bean in the mix on this long conveyor belt. The belt moves and the beans work their way up to a big barrel where the beans are all mixed up together. The beans are then moved by another conveyor belt to those big white containers in the picture (top left a bit) above where they wait to go to the packaging area.
There’s a bean artist who gets to spend all of their time making these Jelly Belly bean works of art. How fun would that be?! Some fun facts: each work of art is typically 4’x5′, each picture weighs about 100 pounds with the frame, it takes around 100 hours from start to finish, and it takes somewhere around 12,000 beans to make one masterpiece.
One of the best things about the Jelly Belly factory…they’ve got all of the flavors! And I do mean all of them. We, of course, had to take home some samples. Just a few. **wink, wink**
We really enjoyed exploring the San Francisco area! There was so much to see and do that we didn’t even scratch the surface with two very full weeks of adventuring. Maybe someday we’ll travel through the area again so we can hit some of the things we missed…when we’re ready to face the huge crowds again.
Hey Guys! We spent two weeks in the San Francisco area. We crammed so much into those two weeks that I’ve decided to break up this area into two separate posts. I could easily do four posts…we saw that much…but I’ll cram it all into two to save some time. The RV park we were staying in was in the town of Vacaville and it was in a great location for exploring the area without being right in middle of the San Francisco crowds all the time.
We went to five National Park Units while we were in the San Francisco area. Five! We missed a few…they either weren’t open or we didn’t plan far enough ahead and we missed out on tickets. Y’all know how far out we plan our travels so the fact that we missed out on tickets…sigh…should tell you how fast tickets are snatched up at popular parks.
John Muir is known as the “Father of the National Parks” and the “Patron Saint of the American Wilderness”. He devoted most of his life to preserving the wild places that he loved so much. We’re big fans of John Muir and what his perseverance to save the wild spaces did for future generations. All over our Country, in the many National Park Units we’ve visited we’ve heard his name spoken with a kind of reverence. It is because of him, that we have National Parks. We visited Muir National Historic Site in Martinz, CA one afternoon. It was just as thrilling to us to walk in John Muir’s home as it was for us to walk through the home of Abraham Lincoln or Lyndon B. Johnson or well, any of the other great homes we’ve visited during our travels across the US.
Muir spent quite a bit of his time in solitude as he explored and studied nature. Around the time John was turning forty, some of his friends started to urge him to return to society. Upon his return, a friend of his introduced him to his future wife, Louisa Strentzel. Louisa was the daughter of Dr. Strenzel who owned a 2,600 acre fruit orchard. Muir and Dr. Strentzel went into business together and within five years, Muir had earned enough money to keep his family living well for the rest of their lives. Muir spent the next ten years working on the orchard. He was a devoted husband and father to his two daughters, but his heart was still yearning for the wild places. Louisa encouraged him to go back to the mountains for some respite. He went. Sometimes he would go alone and other times he would take his daughters.
Muir called it his “scribble den”. This is the room where John Muir wrote most of his books and published articles. He would worry about the wording of his books and articles in his determination to make others see how important the preservation of wilderness is. Many of his journals helped in the preservation of National Parks even after his death in 1914.
Muir Woods National Monument was established in 1908. When John Muir found out that they’d named this park after him he said, “This is the best tree lover’s monument that could possibly be found in all the forests of the world.”
Muir Woods National Monument was our first glimpse of the coastal redwoods. The coastal redwoods are in the same family as the giant sequoia trees we fell in love with while we were exploring Sequoia National Park. Coastal redwoods are known as the tallest living things on Earth. In Muir Woods, there’s a tree that reaches up to 258 feet above the forest floor. To give you some perspective…that is about the height of a 23 story building. These giant trees need the moderate temperatures and fog that the northern California coast provides them with in order to survive.
Muir Woods National Monument is a little tricky to get to. You have to make prior arrangements to either claim one of the few parking spots at the park or to get a ticket with a shuttle bus. We chose to take the first shuttle bus of the day in hopes of avoiding the mass of people. This park gets over a million visitors a year. Our plan worked. We were leaving when the park started to feel crowded. We had a great morning walking through the giants…listening to their stories…and marveling at their height. And freezing. We weren’t prepared for how cold it was!
In December of 1941 everything changed for America. Men were sent to fight in the war which left a gaping hole in the American workforce. To fill that hole, the government turned to the women left behind. Around six million women joined the workforce during the war. Rosie the Riveter/ World War II Home Front National Historic Park tells the story of the American workforce during World War II. Women and other minority groups answered the call to help their Country by joining the workforce. It wasn’t easy for them. Many of these women had never worked outside of their home before. They weren’t accepted or welcomed by the men left in the factories.
I didn’t really know what to expect at this NPS Unit. We arrived late in the day and was rushed to get through it all. I could have easily spent hours here reading all of the memories. I hope to revisit this one again someday.
We finally made it to the California State Capitol Building in Sacramento! I’m going to be totally honest with you. I’m behind on writing posts…it’s been almost two months since we were at the California SCB and while I do love this dome…it’s really all I remember about the building itself…other than an awful lot of pink. Don’t get me wrong…it’s a lovely building. We took a guided tour and our docent was very enthusiastic about how big and powerful California has always been. This was pointed out numerous times. It was also admitted that the reason this SCB looks so much like the National Capital Building is because the plans for the NCB somehow fell into the hands of the California SCB planners…so yeah, there’s that too. It was for sure, the oddest docent led tour we’ve ever had of a SCB.
The day we went there was a parade and several protests. We didn’t’ stick around for any of it. Crowds aren’t really our thing. At all.
There was a really nice rose garden! So many different colors of roses! There were also some other really pretty flowers on the SCB’s grounds. It really was a very pretty campus.
We found a really good old fashioned diner in Martinez, CA while we were visiting the John Muir National Historic Site. Great burgers and milk shakes!
Stay tuned for part two of our San Francisco area adventures!
Hey Guys! Yosemite Part Two! We spent a day and a half in Yosemite Valley and well…I was kind of disappointed. The views were stellar. The hikes were available. But, it was so incredibly crowded that it really felt more like a day at an amusement park. We couldn’t get away from the crowd no matter what time we got to the park or where in the valley we went.
If you look at a map of Yosemite National Park, you’ll see it’s actually separated into different regions. You’ve got Yosemite Valley where most people go…but then you’ve also got Wawona, Glacier Road, Hetch Hetchy, and Tioga Road areas. We tried to go to Mariposa Grove in the Wawona area but it was closed for restoration. Hetch Hetchy was a three hour drive from where we were staying which means six hours of just travel time…that’s half the day gone. We had already planned on driving Tioga Road…but we met a great family at Park Sierra (where we were staying) and they gave us tips on not only Tioga Road but also Glacier Road.
We drove a lot during all of our Yosemite NP explorations. One of my biggest tips for you if you’re heading to Yosemite is to get gas before heading into the park. Check out those gas prices. We saw two different gas stations that were close-ish to the park and both of them were super pricey.
The first time we tried to explore Glacier Road was during a weekend. It was a Sunday afternoon and we thought maybe the weekend crowds would’ve started thinning out. We were wrong. So very wrong. We got there and there was an hour wait just to go up the road. So, we skipped it for later. We were able to take an afternoon mid-week to explore Glacier Road and it was so much better. Not nearly the amount of people and no waiting. There are several pull outs for trails but we passed them to head to the very end of the road and Glacier Point.
Glacier Point is an overlook that sits 3,000 feet above the Yosemite Valley floor. You get unobstructed views of Yosemite Valley, upper and lower Yosemite Falls, Vernal and Nevada Falls, Half Dome, and some High Sierra snow capped peaks in the distance. Talk about eye candy. It was my favorite view of the entire valley. We were told that sunset from Glacier Point is phenomenal. We didn’t get to stay for it, but I would love to go back one day and see it.
One of my favorite hikes in Yosemite National Park is on Glacier Road. The Taft Point trial is only one mile (one way). You start out in a lovely forest setting and the trail meanders through a meadow before dropping down and spitting you out on this canyon rim. Now, one of the interesting things about this steep sided canyon is that it has these really cool fissures! Guys! Check out this fissure! There are several of them all along Taft Point. These fissures plunge 2,000 feet straight down. Some are wide and some of the fissures are narrow.
Taft Point gives you an amazing view of El Capitan. We spent some time out on the point wandering around. We pretty much had the place to ourselves. A couple of groups of people were getting there right about the time we were heading back. I have four books on National Parks and what to see and do in each park. The Taft Point hike was only in one of them and it was by far my favorite hike we did in the park. It was only two miles round trip, the hike was easy enough for any physical level, and the views were pretty darn amazing. Plus, we had the place to ourselves. We didn’t have to wait in line to get a glimpse.
It took us an entire day to explore Tioga Road. It might only be a 39 mile scenic drive, but there is so much to see and do. Tioga Road is closed during the winter months. We lucked out and it opened a couple of weeks before we got there. At Olmstead Point you can see granite exposed by years of weathering and erosion. Olmstead Point is also a great place to get a birds-eye-view of Tenaya Lake. At 8,149 feet, Tenaya Lake is one of Yosemite’s biggest natural lakes. The Native Americans called it Py-we-ack which means shining rocks. Thousands of years ago the rocks around the lake were polished smooth by glacier movement and they still reflect and “shine” in the golden glow of the setting sun.
Toulumne Meadows started out millions of years ago under a sea of ice that was more than 2,000 feet deep. This is the view…right here in this spot back in 1889, where John Muir and Robert Underwood Johnson sat around a campfire discussing ways to protect this area of the Sierra Nevadas. One year later, in 1890, Yosemite National Park was born.
Toulumne Meadows has panoramic vistas of snow capped mountains and domes. It’s one of the largest sub-alpine meadows in the Sierra Nevadas…and it’s where you’ll find Soda Springs. The biggest part of the spring is protected within the enclosure in the pic above. Soda Springs has carbonated water bubbling and percolating up right out of the ground. The minerals in the soda water has turned the area around it a rusty red color. It was fun to stand there and watch it. It would bubble for a bit and then stop…then start back up. We found fresh tracks around it so we’re pretty sure the animals in the area are drinking it. People used to drink it too, but the Park Service now discourages people from drinking it due to possible ground contamination.
Tioga Road is Yosemite’s only road through the High Sierra country. From 6,200 feet all the way up to almost 10,000 feet at Tioga Pass is California’s highest automobile pass. Once you cross Tioga Pass, you exit Yosemite NP and start to descend down to the small town of Lee Vining.
We got a tip about a place to eat in Lee Vining. Whoa Nellie Deli shares its space with a gas station and a gift store. You might expect their food to be “fast food”, but it’s not even close to fast food. I had the lobster and crab Tioga Taquitos and they were the bomb!! Is that saying even still used? We have to thank our new friends, the Buoy family, for letting us know about this place.
Right down the road from Whoa Nellie Deli is Mono Lake Tufa State National Reserve. We didn’t have much time, but we drove down and took a quick peak at the lake. What the heck is tuffa? See those structures out in the water? That, is tuffa. Basically, it’s a limestone tower that forms over a freshwater spring within the lake. If we could figure out a way that didn’t require taking our home-on-wheels over huge scary mountain passes we could totally spend some time in the Lee Vining area. Between the lake and a few state parks…I was bummed our RV park was so far away from the area.
We ended up enjoying Yosemite National Park way more than we thought we would after our first experience in Yosemite Valley. There are places that still feel wild and while you might have to work a little harder to get to them, your efforts are completely worth it.
I wish we’d had this book from the start of our Yosemite National Park exploring. All of the park roads have little numbered signs at different points along the roads. This book tells you what all of those signs and areas are. Plus there’s a ton on Yosemite history and geology. We bought ours at the Toulumne Meadows Visitor Center but, it’s also available on Amazon and would be a great planning tool.
There were a few pretties in the area. I love these bright pink ones! These light lilac colored blooms were sprinkled throughout the park. I’m a sucker for purple…
We enjoyed our time in Yosemite. It’s easy to see why it has inspired so many people throughout it’s history. Between the sheer size of the park and the number of people who visit, planning is essential to seeing everything you want to see in this park.
“It is by far the grandest of all the special temples of Nature I was ever permitted to enter.” ~John Muir
