Our Great California Adventure – On the Road

My brother decided to get married to his sweetheart in Santa Barbara.  We all were so excited to be able to turn it into a fun family vacation/road trip.  What a ton of fun we had!  One of the best things we decided to do was rent a car.  Our Volvo is, what I would call, sub-compact and our Suburban…well, that was completely out of the question due to the gas mileage.  Both of our cars are a little older too and we were unsure of how they would do on a 2500 mile road trip.   That, plus the wear and tear on the car was enough to entice us to look into a rental.

We ended up with a Subaru Legacy sedan.  It was fuel economical, had tons of room inside for all four of us, and plenty of trunk space (well, sort of).  We were at least able to fit everything in, albeit a snug fit.

This was our home away from home for 2500 miles in 11 days.  Cute car, huh?

Here we go!

 

 

Our first leg of the drive looked mostly like this

Stopped in Winnemucca to grab a bite.  We are big fans of The Griddle here in Boise and we heard there was one here too so that’s what we decided on.  Good food!

Our first stop was to visit Roy, Julie, Bryan, and James Warner (Roy is Reid’s cousin).  They were so gracious to put us up for the night.  We enjoyed dinner, lots of great conversation and some fun games that evening.

 

 

We were very road-weary but so grateful for a fun (lots of singing and audio books!) beginning to our trip.

Our Visit with Grandma Deb and Grandpa Ben

Since the family was still away at Elise’s graduation when we arrived at their home, this is who greeted us:

Lucky Dog

Our first day with the Repponds, we decided to go to the American Girl Store, something Camille had on her “yes, let’s do that!” list.  Grandma Deb and Celeste came along and we even managed to drag Reid along too (although, I think he spent more time in the food court than in the store).  Camille found some neat treasures.  Most of the time, the American Girl Store and catalog are wonderful jump-start inspirations for making her own doll clothing and furniture.

Later that afternoon, we took a lovely walk down to Carkeek Park and Beach.  The weather was beautiful and we were dying to go to a beach (another item on Camille’s to-do list).  I just love how Camille lights up with excitement when she is near any body of water whatsoever.  We had lots of fun digging in the sand for creatures and rocks.

Road Trip Beginnings

Our road trip fun began on June 14th at about noon.  The weather in Boise was already well into the 90’s and extremely hot so we were ready to head to nice, mild Seattle.  Our first stop is always the same on our way to Seattle…the Starbucks in Baker City, Oregon.

Happy girls

Drinks in hand, we are now ready for the remaining six hours of the drive.  Got our handy dandy technical devices on board.

Many cords = happy travelers

Love this man!  He so willingly drives the many hundreds of miles every time.  I might jump in to relieve him for an hour or two but he definitely does the lion’s share of the driving.

Oregon Coast Vacation

We took a wonderful trip to the Oregon Coast in September 2012 with our family and our dearest friends, the Kalouseks.  It was late September so we had no idea what to expect for weather, but it was so beautiful we could hardly believe it!  All my trips to the Oregon Coast in the past were cold, dreary, windy, and foggy.  I think the difference was that we were on the Southern coast in Gold Beach, not too far from the California border.

We rented a house with absolutely stunning views.  It sat up on a hillside and was just a short 1/2 mile down to the beach.  It was secluded and had all the amenities that we needed for a big group.  Such a wonderful time!

On the way, we stopped at Crater Lake.

The problem with sunset pictures is that they never do this spectacular feast for the eyes justice (especially with the iphone).

We went for a 2 hour beach horseback ride toward the end of our trip.  We went out on some dunes and got to lope the horses in the surf.  The weather was beautiful the entire time we were there….except that day!  It was quite foggy and drizzly and we all were pretty cold by the time we got in.  But still a wonderful experience.

The day before we left all the adults went on a little hiking/exploring adventure.  We came upon this old growth forest area that had spectacularly tall trees.  We had fun.

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These rocks were just so pretty.  This beach was always completely empty so we felt like we had it all to ourselves.

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