The Road Barely Traveled!

Since we have already traveled the road less traveled, the road we traveled on Friday was definitely the road barely traveled.  It didn't start out that way.  We left the Casa de la Playa and starting making our way to the Portland area.  Our first stop was revisiting the Yaquina Head Lighthouse.  Even though the weather was better, it was hard to get a good picture because of all the people.  We were able to go inside today and walk all the way to the top.  There are some really cool views from the light room.

It was low tide when we got there and there were some good tide pools.  Our family didn't go down to the round rock beach again, but Stewart's did.  They said it was better then the touch areas at the aquarium.  So there you have it.  Don't waste your money.  Just go the the lighthouse at low tide!

After the lighthouse, we went to a place called Izzy's in Newport for lunch.  It is an all you can eat place where you can custom order parts of the meal.  The kids loooooved it.  I have never seen Jake and Corbin eat so much food.  And to top it off, I think they drained the ice cream machine.  They kept saying, "Can we come here again."

After lunch is when we head down the barely traveled road.  We were going to go see this 240 foot suspension foot bridge and waterfall called the Drift Creek Falls.  The road quickly turned from a two lane to a one lane.  It was heavily lined with trees.  But it was very neat looking.  We made it to the parking lot.  It was a 1 1/2 mile hike down the bridge and waterfall.  Then you had to hike up to get back to the cars.  It was a well groomed trail.  The trees and greenery was just beautiful.  My pictures don't give it justice.

The walk down was pretty easy. From the bridge we went down to the creek at the bottom and climb across the rocks to get a better view of the waterfall.  The boys thought it was awesome.  They were like little monkeys climbing all over.

 

On the way back up the trail, Wayne and I took Jake, Ellie and Corbin on what they called the North Loop.  I was a harder and longer trail.  Brian and Julie took Devin the easy way back.  Devin was not happy about hiking at all.  He did okay on the way down, but really hated walking back up.  At the very end of the trail, Devin completely refused to walk any more.  Brian is such a great dad!

After we finished our hike, we were all exhausted and decided it was time to get to our hotel.  We noticed a road sign that said the highway we wanted to take to Portland was only 8 more miles down the road and it would be much further to back track.  We decided to take the shorter distance.  This is when the road got a little primitive.  The road narrowed and became gravel for parts of it.  We were very fortunate that it was only 8 miles!  At the end of the road, we stumbled upon this great covered bridge.  When we pulled in, there was a man walking over to the bridge from his horse barn that was just to the right of the bridge.  He was a cowboy and he was walking around with his shirt off.  He had some music playing loudly and apparently was taking a break from shoeing his horses.  I felt like we had come across a scene from a romance novel!  So if you know anyone looking, for this kind of thing, I'll send you the directions!  (Lisa, if your reading, he was too old for you.)

We made it to the hotel safely and slept like rocks!

 

Newport Sight Seeing

On Thursday, the weather was changing and it was supposed to be rainy.  We decide we would go to Newport and visit the Oregon Coast Aquarium.  It was overpriced for how big it was, but we still had fun.  Taking pictures in a dark building with lots of glass is the worst.  Very few of them turn out.  So here's a photo tour of the ones that did.

 Trying to get our kids to smile for a picture after walking around for a couple of hours turned out to be quite a task, but we finally got one.  After the aquarium, we went to the Yaquina Head Lighthouse.  The rain had just barely stopped when we left the lighthouse's interpretive center and it was beautiful out.  This lighthouse is probably my favorite on the Oregon coast.  We didn't make it in time for the tour to the top, but we plan to go again on Friday on our way to Portland.

 

While there, we followed one of the staircases down to this rocky coast line.  The rocks were so cool.  They were a dark grey and about the size of baseballs.  It was very hard to walk on but the sound it made when the waves receded was amazing.  I took video of it.  But since I don't know how to load video to my blog, you will just have to experience it for yourself sometime!

It's not too often that Wayne and I get pictures together or even family pictures for that matter.  I'm usually behind the camera.  It is so much fun to have another family with us that can take pictures of us.  Thanks, Stewarts!

High Tide Fun

Wednesday we took it easy.  The kids played up by the beach house in the morning.  Jake and Corbin were up to no good as usual and Ellie built castles.

 

After lunch we went down to the beach and played in the water.  It was high tide and the waves were coming in pretty good.

 Jake built this circle thing in the sand.  I'm not sure what it is but he sure enjoyed making it!

Casa de la Playa!

Our first day at the Casa de la Playa in Waldport was a blast.  After breakfast we headed out to play in the tide pools the low tide had left. I'm pretty sure the big boys had just as much fun as the younger boys. 

Corbin, Jake, Wayne and Brian connecting tide pools.

Ellie just playing by herself. 

Devin didn't like getting into the ocean much.  The waves would hit his feet and he would take of running.

The view looking south.

Ellie is so good with Devin.  The tide was on the way back up and so she took him back to a better part of the beach to play.

Sea lion watching us play.

Julie got her game face on and help the kids build a great castle.

Devin and Ellie got wore out and decided to lay on the sand for a little break.  Ellie made both of them a sand pillow.  I think a few more minutes and Devin would have been asleep for sure.

Wayne and Corbin went back out to where the tide pools were at in the first pictures.  Since it was a big sand bar it was nice and shallow, except when waves came in.  If you look to the left of Wayne you can see Corbin getting hit by a good one.

This is a secret. DO NOT TELL ELLIE!

Ellie had looked all day to find some good shells or a sand dollar but was unable to.  The boys had found some good shells and Ellie was getting pretty sad that she hadn't.  Before dinner the grown ups went into town and I bought a sand dollar and another cool looking shell.  After dinner, Wayne and I carefully placed the shells where she would find them in some tide pools.  She was sooooo excited.  No one (meaning the boys) had been able to find a whole sand dollar!  That made her day.  It's the little things we do for our children that bring them such joy.  None of you better tell her what we did.  It would break her heart.

This is the view from the beach house.  It sits up a small hill.  The tide was already going back down by this time, so it looks like the ocean is really far away.  I'm not sure what today holds yet, but I'm sure that I will have some great pics to post.

The Road Less Traveled

We took of Sunday for our trip to the Oregon coast.  We drove to Bend, OR the first night.  On Monday, we decided to take a scenic way to the coast.  We started out on Highway 242.

 The view from my seat was a beautiful tree lined road.

 Jake thought this pointy mountain was pretty cool.

 At the summit of this mountain range was a lava field with an observation area where you could see all the surrounding mountains.  You could even see Mount Hood on a clear day.  Our day was rainy and we were unable to see it.

 The observation point.

 The Two Sisters mountains behind our family.

 As we headed down from the summit, the road got very curvy.  Ellie immediately started to get car sick.  We gave her a motion sickness pill and it knocked her out.  She ended up sleeping until we got to Eugene.  She missed the covered bridges we stopped at altogether.  Maybe we should only give her a half of pill next time!

 This is the Belknap Bridge along Highway 126.

 This is another bridge that was along the 126.  It's call the Goodpasture Bridge.

The kids were very excited to finally reach the coast after spending two days in the car.  This is the Heceta Head Lighthouse just north of Florence.  We reached the beach house safely and the kids are enjoying the beach.  I will post more pics in the next couple of days.