Bucket list trip to the Northwest!

Back in July Kent and I went on a 13-day road trip. I'll give you as many days as I can get through today and continue tomorrow. 

Day one - July 8:
Our goal was to get as far in the northwestern direction as possible today. We drove 10.5 hours to Pendleton, OR. The night before we left, our wonderful home teacher and his wife brought us a "happy trip" basket. It included Gatorade, granola bars, trail mix etc. etc. What a nice surprise!

I drove first:

Kent navigated

We took a rest stop for lunch

It was nice to be out of the car for a bit!

After lunch we traded drivers. He wasn't smiling in this one so I told him to smile -----

 

I guess you get what you ask for. :)

IT WAS SOOOOO HOT!!!!

We arrived in Oregon in early evening. Even though it had been a long day, we really enjoyed the drive and being together.

That night we stayed in Pendleton. We ate dinner in this small town restaurant called the Rainbow Cafe. It was delicious. 

 Kent "patiently" waiting for his meal

This guy was watching over our table

They had these little books at the table to entertain ourselves with while we waited. Funny. :)

Food at last. It was their version of KFC - really, really good. :)

Day 2:

After a good night's rest we were ready for day 2. Today we drove through eastern Washington and were surprised to see that much of it looks like western Utah - prairie, sage brush, and wide open views. 

As we got closer to the Cascade mountains, we felt like were were getting into more wilderness. 

We had a nice lunch stop at a place called Dry Falls. It was once the largest waterfall on the planet during or after the last ice age. 

 Maybe you can read the story for yourselves.

We spent the night in a place called Winthrop, Washington. This was one of my favorite hotels of the trip. The lodging was right on the river.

We saw river floaters

 A mother deer and her baby

Beautiful scenery

 A bald eagle

 This is right outside our patio door

She was curious about the stairs, but . . .

. . . realized her error and changed directions.

That night, the night hawks and bats came out. Kent just pointed his camera and shot multiple pictures. He actually caught a few bats in flight:

Before dinner we wandered through the rustic, trendy little town. It was great.

After dinner we enjoyed some lounging on the banks of the river, behind our hotel room.

We literally fell in love with these chairs, and ordered 2 of them when we got home. :)  !!!

Oh, in case you ever want to stay there, it is called the Hotel Rio Vista.

Catch-up Collage

 

Before today's posting of our road trip I have missed several other events. Here is a smattering of pictures:

Aspen, Ethan, and Haley took part in a play at their school. The name - "Hamlet, Zombie Killer of Denmark"!!

Our grandson, Jackson, became an Eagle Scout. I've never been this close to an eagle before:

So proud of you, Jackson! [Isn't his mom a beauty?!!!]


I had an activity day with most of the grand kids. They made Easter people and cookies - it was actually quite a disaster.

Easter Sunday ties

Easter Egg hunt

We are dividing the candy up evenly between all of the grandkids. {And eating the ones we like the best in the process!}

Aspen was in her Middle School choir. The teacher told the class, at the beginning of the term, that they could either do the concert Karaoke style or one of them would need to find a pianist. Aspen found me. :) It was a lot of fun - and they even gave me a "special thanks" on the back of the program.

I accompanied the last 3 songs before the solos

Here we are perfoming

 

Grace was our conductor. Sorry for the scary zombie eyes - not sure how to fix that!!!

 

 

 

Aspen sang a solo in the song "Clarity"!

 

After the concert the choir presented me with flowers, a card, and my favorite candy! Wow!!!

Add caption

 

Road Trip! Day 2

 

 Goodbye Wendover - hello more dirt roads!

 

 

 

 

"Why more dirt roads?" you ask. We followed the Pony Express Trail today.

This tells you why the Pony Express was started:

This is the remains of one of the stations. Not a safe place, really, for those who lived there. Many died from Indian attacks. Actually, more station workers died than riders.

Some of the stations were there merely for the riders to change horses. That happened every 15-20 miles or so. After 75-100 miles the riders would change as well.

 

This is a replica of what a station would have looked like. Notice the rider approaching to change horses. :)

More amazing scenery:

 

 And a very dirty car!

This was our lunch stop. The wind was blowing so hard that we had to finish our meal in the car. I mean, hard - it blew half of my sandwich and my full cup of soda off the table! I needed help opening the outhouse door. HARD!!!



I took this because it was written by Lavinia Porter - possible ancestor. :)

 

Out in the middle of this barren desert is the Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge

 

We drove on all of the open roads in the refuge. But, they close of some of them when the birds are nesting - to protect them.

Now back on the Pony Express trail

Shocker - a paved road!!!!

 

We did eventually get back onto nicely paved roads {not as in the example above :) } It was nice to get home - and wash the car.
Thanks for a great trip, Kent!