Oregon Adventure

Our campsite at Willard Bay

We left for Oregon on Memorial Day and camped two nights on the way. We stayed at a State Park near Ogden, UT (just north of Salt Lake City) called Willard Bay State Park and the second night we camped at Emigrant Springs State Park in Idaho. We had a pretty campsite at Willard Bay that looked out on the water. And we were in a beautiful forest in the Blue Mountains the second night of camping. Both campgrounds were very convenient to our driving route -- but were noisy. We could hear the highway from both sites. Next time we might consider driving a little ways off the road to have a more peaceful setting.
Here is a picture of the sun setting over Willard Bay. We didn't have much sunlight to work with when we arrived. We hurriedly set up our tent and ended up eating chicken soup for supper in the dark. The hot soup tasted good!

Emigrant Springs State Park

We arrived at Mikes after a very scenic drive through the Columbia River Gorge. We stopped and ate our lunch at a rest area long the Columbia River. And we even saw Mount Hood (we never saw it on our drive home -- it was cloudy and raining).

Here is a picture of Mike's new house

which is nestled in the Hoyt Arboretum. We had miles of walking trails through beautiful trees just out Mike's front door. Here are a couple of shots of the inside of Mike's house:
We took the trails through the Arboretum down to the Portland Zoo on Friday. Luke took a snooze in the stroller -- as we spent 3 hours seeing the zoo. He missed seeing the giraffes and zebras. The Children's Museum is also in walking distance from Mike's house -- maybe we'll check this out next time we're visiting.
We took a day trip to Corvallis, OR. Pat had meetings with scientists from Oregon State. The kids and I explored Corvallis while he had his meetings. And then we had lunch with Regi, a church friend of Lois and John's when they were students at OSU. It was a delight to meet Regi!When we returned from Corvallis, we celebrated Luke's first birthday. He enjoyed the frosting but didn't care for the chocolate cake. I'll have to try a different flavor cake for his actual birthday. The kids each had a package to open from Nana's trip to Chicoteague Island. They now all have horse t-shirts.
Our last day together we took a trip to the coast at low tide and saw sea anemones, barnacles, and mussels in the tide pools. It was a moist day -- what I had expected of Oregon weather (it was dry up to this point in our trip). But it didn't stop all of us from enjoying the ocean and exploring the tide pools. Jacob loved climbing on the rocks. And Hannah loved touching the sea anemones and watching them close up and squirt water.
It rained most of our drive home. So we ended up staying at a KOA in Twin Falls, ID with Lois and the dogs. We rented a little two-room cabin. It was cute...but I didn't get any pictures because it rained the whole time we were there. I have now added two more states to the list of places I have been -- Oregon and Idaho!