3 posts tagged “pacific nw”

We went on a nice long walk on Saturday.  E hadn't ever been to the park on the other side of the freeway (I-205) and so we walked over there.  Don't worry, there's an overpass, we didn't try running acrossed a major interstate or anything!

I brought my camera along and I'm glad I did, I got some pictures that I was very happy with.  These are some of my favorites:

The snake was itty bitty, we almost missed him.  He was more the size of a big worm than a snake.  And the acorns were RIGHT next to the freeway, amazing that the trees were so full of acorns so close to all the cars driving by.

 And the rest are in a collection for your enjoyment. ;) (well, actually, more for my archiving purposes!)

We walked all the way down to Subway after being at the park, and that was a bit too long for my legs - my hip was hurting, I felt about 50 years old LOL!

But it was nice Kristine+Eric time, and perfect weather - not too hot, not too cool - and good excercise too.  Weekends are a good thing, dontchaknow?

What's the most extreme weather you've been in? A memorable storm? Heat wave? Or something else?

I've been in tornados, ice storms, and heat waves.  We lived in Michigan when I was little (until I was 10) and the weather is definitely more severe than our current home in Washington.

Probably the most memorable weather storm in my childhood was the ice storm when I was 5 or 6.  It was SO icy and cold that all the power lines froze and we were out of power for many days in a row and had to go stay in a local high school. (the little girl that slept in the cots next to us stole my Little Professor, and I was so sad).  My mom got so paranoid after being in that gym for a few days that we went and stayed with a friend who did have power for another day or so (and we had delicious oatmeal because the made it with sugar, which was NOT how our mom let us have it :D).

We've had some pretty hot streaks both here (just written on vox about one such streak) and then in Walla Walla where I went to college (my freshman year when I first moved in was absolutely insanely hot).  The first trip I made to southern california alone in 98 to visit E's house and meet his family was crazy hot - I wasn't expecting it to be so hot you could barely leave the car.

I guess I'm pretty lucky that there hasn't been anything more severe in my lifetime; I'll stick with my mostly the same all year round weather that it's supposed to be in the NW.

We did break records on Friday, btw. At 104 degrees, we were one degree short of the hottest day ever recorded in vancouver, but still beat the record for the hottest July 21st.  This is way crazy for our area, we almost never get above 100.  And I like it that way!  Luckily, Saturday cooled down a touch (99ish) and today is even a little more, so it looks like the worst is over for the moment.  Phew!  I have only gone outside in the last few days to water my flowers, and even then, I know it's dang hot!

On Monday, Eric and me both had some time, so we went out driving.  Spent the afternoon driving around in a big circle. ;)

Not too long ago, there was a QOTD that asked where you'd take out of town visitors.  One of my answers was the route we took, because somehow, E hadn't been to Crown Point yet.

We went down the gorge on the Washington side of the river, and contemplated stopping in Camas for Chinese at our favorite place.  But we didn't, E knew I'd been looking forward to the burgers once we got out further.  We call this amazing view on the side of the road the "Breathtaking View" - self explainatory. ;)  I took some great pictures while we were there, it's so beautiful that it doesn't take a great photographer to capture the breathtakingness of it.  We did stop at Bonneville Dam and were surprised at all of the gates and fences they have set up.  That's kinda sad that it's not as open as it once was.

Then we headed across the Bridge of the Gods , which is so pretty and completely worth the $1.00 toll to cross it.  Sidenote: My dad goes across this bridge frequently, or he used to, so much that he calls his change holder in his car the "bridge of the gods drawer" :P   Once you've made it across the bridge, it's Cascade Locks, which has a great ice cream/burger joint, East Wind drive in .  Yay for blueberry malt to drink on the rest of our drive!

Our next stop was a little turned around, because the road has changed since I was going to Crown Point last.  I thought that if you drove down to Multnomah falls, you'd end up being able to get on the old highway.  But no, you have to get off on an earlier exit, oops.  And being memorial day, there were TONS of people, so it took even longer to make it back out of the Mulnomah falls parking lots.

Continuing on, it's a windy and flashy road.  Flashy because there's so many trees that the light flashes on and off.  I now remember how many times I was almost sick going up that hill!

But the view at Crown Point really makes up for it once you get on top of the hill.  We used to live in a house that's directly across the river, so of course that's the first thing I had to point out to E.  It's brown and green now, so it's not as noticable as it was when it was red and white, but still definitely there!  My mom claims that for the first while we lived in the house, she always closed the curtains before bed, worrying someone would see in.  It's a LONG ways away, and once you go over there, you see that the chance are slim... but there are now for-pay telescopes, and I do wonder how much *they* can see ;)  Hee hee!

And after hanging around inside the building for a while, we made the drive back down the hill.  The other way, on the Oregon side, to go through Corbett and then down 84 instead of going all the way back around in Washington.

By the time we made it across the 205 bridge, we'd made a big giant loop.  All in all, about a 100 mile drive of very pretty scenery.  And even though it was a touch cloudy when we left, it turned BEAUTIFUL along the way and we had blue skys for most of the trip.  Feel free to look through my pictures in my "pacific nw" collection below, if you'd like!