Red Hair and White Knuckles

Jeff and I got a motorcycle. It's a Kawasaki KLR 650 Dual Sport (meaning it's good both off road and on road). So we decided to take a motorcycle road trip to break it in. Although if any of you have ever ridden a motorcycle for any length of time I'm sure you know that it broke us in more than anything (sore hinny).






So once we were all packed and ready to go we headed over the mountain pass and our first stop was Leavenworth. This is a popular tourist and local attraction as it is a Bavarian themed village. They have a Christmas tree lighting ceremony in the winter that attracts thousands and in the summer there's lots of art festivals, hikes and October fest in the fall. I didn't really get any shots of the village this time as we've been here before and the couple I did get didn't really turn out well but this was a pretty cute and friendly mountain goat.

So Aplets and Cotlets are a pretty delicious treat that are quite popular in the Northwest. I'd never heard of them till I moved here. They are kind of a jelly type candy with nuts that are rolled in powdered sugar. Although I have come to know that to some it is an acquired taste and others just plain don't like them. The traditional flavors (as the name denotes) are apple and apricot, however they have a ton of different flavors and if you go to the factory which is where this picture was taken then you get to sample a tone of stuff for free. They even have new product sampling and you can take a survey and tell them what you think. It was a fun stop on our way to Winthrop. This factory is located in Cashmere, just outside of Leavenworth.

So we were almost to Winthrop when we saw this bridge and had to stop. There are a lot of these foot traffic bridges across the Columbia river and I tried to get Jeff to cross this one but try as I might he wouldn't do it. I guess I can't blame the guy as I wouldn't have done it either.






We stayed in this Shackteau, which is owned by Jeff's boss. It's right on the river and it's not fancy it's basically camping but we didn't have to set up a tent and there were sleeping pads inside which made for a comfortable night sleep. When we pulled up there was a whole family of deer sleeping under the awning.



This is the town of Winthrop which is an old west themed town, however this is actually a picture of my bad helmet hair and me locking the helmets on the bike.



Jeff had the camera as you can tell. So the background shows what this whole town basically looks like, all the restaurants and stores are all in this old west theme. The side walks are wooden and they even have some western saddles you can sit on at the ice cream shop. Somehow we didn't get as many pictures of the town as I thought but you get the idea, plus you can google it.




This guy was in front of one of the shops and we thought he was pretty cool. You can see the wooden plank sidewalk that lines the street and you get the idea that it's a pretty cool town.



There is a lodge called sunset lodge about 9 miles from town and this is the view from the lodge. This was about 7am and they were rounding up the horses for trail rides. Pretty amazing view. And just to clarify this is Eastern Washington.




So on our way home we drove over a different mountain pass, it was really cold, as you can tell there is still snow and it happened to rain on us just after this picture was taken but what an amazing site. The road was really twisty and steep going up over this pass, you kinda get the idea in the picture below.

This part of the highway was blocked because they were redoing the park that overlooks the highway, however the joy of being on a motorcycle is that you can simply drive around the gate at your own risk and get the pictures anyways, which is how we got the picture of the highway below. This was a pretty fun trip, although we were sorely unprepared in many ways (we know better know) we are already planning our next trip.

Spring Hike

A couple of weeks ago we hiked Tokul Creek. This is a really pretty hike with some old growth trees as you can see in this picture this tree is pretty massive (Jeff's dad is not a dwarf). You get there by driving up into the mountains and oddly enough there is a cow farm right across from the trail head.





Here's Jeff giving me one of his goofy smiles. (I rarely get a real smile on camera) He's standing on this bridge which overlooks the creek. Which by the way is not your run of the mill trickling peaceful creek. It's more like rapids but I guess it looked like a creek to someone.






We took Remmy along for the hike and he was leaning over to look down at the creek too. As you can tell by looking at his back legs he wasn't too thrilled about being up so high. He didn't quite trust that he couldn't fit through the gap between the fence and the bridge. But either way I thought it was cute that he was checking it out.







So this is the creek that runs below the bridge that we are all standing on. I told you it was more like rapids. Although we did get a lot of snow this year so maybe the water level is a little higher because of snow melt. Either way it was a cool view.





Speaking of view this is the view from the trail. You can see the whole valley and the mountains in the distance. It was a bit overcast which is why the pic looks a little white and muted, but the view is spectacular. And this was only like 20 min from our house. That is the plus about living in Washington you have amazing hikes just out your back door.


And by the end of the hike all of the dogs (I only have one but Jeff's parents have a couple) were tired and hot. Libby jumped in this little creek (see this is a creek, ok enough about what a creek is) and layed down to cool off. I couldn't resist getting a shot and I love the fact that I caught her with her tongue out.

Spring

Spring has finally come! Spring is one of those touch and go seasons for any of you who are not familiar with Washington. There can be days where the weather is brilliant and then it will rain for the next two weeks. But when the weather is good, there's nothing like it.
Spring also means that we spend a lot of time in the yard. On this particular day I had just finished mowing the lawn and I looked up and saw a rainbow in the sky. I'm not really sure how this came to be as it had not been raining, but whatever the reason I thought it would be fun to get a picture of it.








Speaking of yard work Jeff and I have been working on taming the trees in our yard. This is a Laurel, yes for any of you who are familiar with this species it is generally a bush. As you can see our bush turned into a massive tree, which looked nice but was creating a bit of a moss problem on the roof. I haven't lived in Washington long enough to know the details but with all the rain and moisture here, there's a lot of moss which grows on the roof and the problem is made worse by trees hanging over, maybe it has to do with the shade. Anyways as you can see we gave the tree a massive haircut and literally had branches piled up to the roof. We did eventually get them cleared away.

As most of you have kids and post pictures of them all of the time I had to throw one in of my dog. Remmy was soaking up the sun and enjoying laying and rolling in the freshly mowed lawn. He loves hanging out in the yard while we work. Occasionally he comes over and starts digging in my garden while I weed. I think he's just trying to figure out what I'm doing but sometimes he digs up my bulbs so I don't encourage his helping. Hope you are all enjoying spring as much as we are and we'll keep you posted on our trips this summer.

Oregon Coast Revisited

What can I say we love the Oregon Coast. We only went for a couple of days this time but the weather couldn't have been better. Jeff's brother Daniel also came along since he hadn't been in years. We visited Jeff's uncle Dave and his family again which was a lot of fun. We only get to see them about once a year so it's nice to get in an extra visit. Dave played tour guide again and on the first day he took us on a hike of the dunes and the beach. We did some beach combing and Jeff's cousin Seabre actually found a message in a bottle. It wasn't anything super cool but how often do you find a message in a bottle. We also took the opportunity to fly our kite, which I never got a picture of but you can use your imagination. Actually the picture above is of Jeff and his brother flying the kite.

The next day Dave took us out to Cape Perpetua/ Neptune (which is where he and his wife MJ got married) and we explored the tide pools.

We also went agate hunting. They are all over the place you just have to know where to look and since Dave has more experience at this than we do, he always spotted them but never told us where they were and then he would walk away leaving us looking for a needle in a hay stack so to speak.

This is a picture of the rocks on the coast. I think they are so beautiful with all the different shell pieces and colored rocks.

Here are some of the smaller agates we found.

This is the beginning of a funny incident. Jeff had been hiking around and not paying attention to the waves and he got splashed with a wave. I couldn't help myself but laugh and so I caught Jeff pouting in this picture.

Not long after that Jeff and I were on our way back and he was trying to take us on a short cut near the water. The plan was to hurry past this one rock before another wave came. He hurried past but I was stuck in a cold shower of salt water. The wave was so large that I knocked me off of the rock I had been standing on and I was half choking cause "my mouth was open and everything" (that line was from Shrek). So that teaches me for laughing at Jeff when he got sprayed (however I got it much worse than he did and we both laughed at me).

This is a better picture cause you can see that I literally got wet from head to toe. Luckily it was warm so I layed out on some rocks to dry. Other than the cold shower it was a really fun trip. The coast is so hit and miss but we went in February and caught some of the best whether they have. I wonder if we'll ever make it down there during the summer. We always say we will but then the summer comes and goes and we haven't gone. But this summer Jeff and I are going to be doing a lot of hiking and camping so we'll see.

Cinnamon Roll Heaven

Sunday night Jeff and I both got a craving for cinnamon rolls. However much to our dismay we discovered that we didn't have enough flour. I figured after that the craving would pass and by Monday we would move on. However Jeff and I were still thinking of those soft sweet rolls covered in cream cheese frosting. So after work we went to the store and got the necessary ingredients. Jeff looked up a recipe that claimed to meet all of our expectations of a perfect cinnamon roll and began the delicate art of making the perfect roll. I assisted him in this matter and soon the rolls were in the pan rising. A while later Jeff asked me to check on the rolls to see if they were ready to go in the oven, I lifted the towel to discover that the pan was not full. Now I had not been present when Jeff filled the pan so I wanted to ask him before I jumped to any conclusions. But as I turned to ask Jeff how many rolls he had originally put in the pan I saw my dog out of the corner of my eye licking his lips. It was at this moment that I began to laugh and could hardly ask Jeff how many rolls he had originally put in the pan. I went over and smelled my dogs face and it was pretty evident what had happened to six rolls. I can't believe it myself that he could put away six raw cinnamon rolls. I was also impressed because he had barely disturbed the dish towel that was covering the pan. After Jeff and I sat and laughed a minute we realized that Remmy was going to have to throw the rolls up. So instead of waiting for the raw dough to work it's magic on his stomach some time in the middle of the night, I gave him a little hydrogen peroxide and within 10 min the whole thing was over. I felt so bad for him. Jeff and I baked and frosted the rolls but after the whole ordeal neither of us wanted cinnamon rolls. When we get around to trying them I'll let you know if the recipe was good. And poor Remmy will probably never enjoy the smell of cinnamon rolls again. Who am I kidding he would probably do it again if given the chance.

Washington Coast

Over Labor Day weekend Jeff and I took our much talked about trip to the Washington Coast. We had been talking about doing this for years and finally decided to go ahead and do it. We brought along Remmy (this was his first road trip) who had a blast as you can see. This was his first time seeing the ocean and Jeff was teaching him how to run at the waves as they receded and how to run from them as they washed up on shore. It wasn't long before he caught onto the game and decided that he loved the ocean. It also worked out that no one was on the beach so he could run and explore as much as he wanted.

We spent the night at the Hoh River Rain Forest which you'll see pictures of below. It's absolutely gorgeous. And the next day we took Remmy to the river to play. He's not too keen on water but we kept throwing in sticks and he was slowly getting farther from the shore to go get them. We tried exercising him as much as possible since he wasn't aloud to hike in the rain forest with us and since we had spent a lot of time in the car. At the end of this trip I think it's the first time I've seen him worn out since he was a puppy. He sat in the back seat of the car slightly catatonic and drooling.

This is part of the Rain Forest. It's one of the few temperate rainforests in the world and one of the largest. These trees had fallen down on their own and so they created this cool trail out of them. This is a place I think everyone should see in their lives. It is so beautiful and so close if you live in Washington. No matter what time of year you go it's going to be damp so dress in layers. And just as an FYI dogs aren't aloud on the trail. We camped here as I said and so we hit the trail early and pretty much had the place to ourselves. I can't say what it would be like on a busy day but I think it's a perfect family trip especially if you do the coast afterwards.

There were many trees like this in the forest. They are created by nurse logs. Trees fall over and begin to decay and other trees begin to grow out of the logs. Eventually their roots take over the tree and it develops this really intricate above ground root system. It was so amazing to me how the forest sustains itself.

This tree was one of many in whats call the "Hall of Mosses". This trail is a must in the forest, everything is green and you feel tiny because these enormous trees are dropping over you with moss. The amazing thing is that you can go on a different trail and you don't really see the moss. The forest is really diverse so it's not like you are walking and seeing the same thing over again on a different trail.

This was our camp site. One of the things we enjoyed the most about camping in the rainforest was that it wasn't very crowded. We passed many camp sites along the way that had a lot more people in them, but the rainforest is about a 20 min drive off of the highway so that's probably why there weren't as many people. We set up underneath a tree so we didn't have to worry about rain and it was really peaceful. The one drawback about this site is that there were no showers, however there were toilets and a place where you could get fresh water. But we didn't really plan this trip around civilization. It was really nice to just explore a bit of the state without a lot of people around. I know that there are places like this all over so I would encourage all of you to explore your state a little, it's a cheap easy way to have a mini vacation.

Ode to a Chapped Runny Nose

You nose,
who are washed and moisturized,
masked and exfoliated,
protected from the sun and occasionally powdered.
You who are pampered far more than my feet
yet they rarely complain
when steeped in mud a foot and a half deep.
You begin to drip and within an hour
are red and chapped and cause me to cower
Tissues with lotion or soft silky cloths
cannot appease you or lessen your blush
And so with disdain I write you this ode
you spoiled, dainty, occasionally powdered,
red, chapped, dripping, hose of a nose.

Original silly poem by Lauren who is somewhat over medicated and recovering from the flu.