4 Haskins (2 former), 3 Lansings and 2 Johnsons for a total of 7 family members crammed into one Ford Explorer loaded to the brim with blankets, pillows, over-packed bags, climbing gear and snacks stacked so high they would rival New York’s Skyscrapers. Tack on a total of 10 days and five states (Utah, Idaho, Oregon, California and Nevada) over 2100 miles and who knows how many hours and you have a one-of-a-kind recipe for fun.
I can’t even do the stories justice. Since our adventures in Prineville where we last left off, and also first began usage of our favorite word ‘obligatory’ (the word first took off in description of the obligatory climbing butt-shot, and has carried through), we have visited Cannon Beach, Oregon. Cannon Beach, located in Northern Oregon, is probably best known for most visible landmark: Haystack Rock. A prominent monolith located just off the beach that plays home to a blanket of seagulls. We spent hours walking up and down the coast, snapping photo after photo of the rock. We walked downtown and enjoyed dinner at some local restaurants, explored the quaint local shops and nearly passed out from all the ice cream (actually, I am pretty sure we did pass out from it once or twice). During our exploration we also discovered a new catch phrase for our trip, ‘mostly’. It seems that the work mentality along the beautiful Oregon coast is slightly more light heartened than our inland Utah, typically opening from “10am-5pm, Mostly”. We caught the ‘mostly’ days.
We topped off our Cannon Beach portion with a bonfire and s’mores, mmmm… mmmmm… good. Travis, Adrienne, Gary, Shelli and I roasted ‘mallows and ate s’mores by the ocean until Gary and the girls decided they had had enough. Travis and I enjoyed a few more hours before calling it a night. After the bonfire and a good nights sleep (mostly) we packed up and traversed the coast all the way down to Gold Beach (very Southern Oregon) stopping along the way for ‘feely rocks’. We learned the intricacies and anatomy of the perfect feely rock, the necessity of the hand to rock fit and the appropriate smoothness and texture by the expert herself Mrs. Pam Haskins. And after Shelli gathered close to a half ton of rocks we were done.
Gold Beach was nice, but short. We pulled in, found dinner, went to bed, got up and said ‘goodbye,’ waving in the distance as we closed in on the Majestic Redwoods and the Trees of Mystery. Travis turned us on to this little wonder where we had a conversation with a 50 foot tall Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox. After strolling through the mammoth redwoods we backtracked our way back to Oregon and along the border to our present destination: Tulelake, California.
Tulelake is the hometown of our one and only Gary Haskins. Gary’s parents still live here in Tulelake making the population a strong 10 or so. Actually, it’s really like a thousand, but you get the picture, right? We spent yesterday eating delicious food, and then eating some more. Grandma Joan has fed us well. After eating again we checked out the Lava beds and went spelunking in the caves. It was an awesome experience. Some of the lava caves are absolutely endless, weaving in and out and over each other. Others are so untouched by the sun that they still house Ice even in the warm weather. Still others house bats and other creatures. It is incredible to see how the lava has cut its way through the rock melting it away. You can still see the organic drips of rock that solidified into unbreakable little points that kept jabbing our kidneys and foreheads as we crawled our way through the narrow passageways.
Post-caves and more food here we are today. The girls took off this morning for a girl’s day out and the boys spent the day around the house being lazy. It’s felt good to be lazy.
It’s been a great vacation, one that will not soon be forgotten. Tomorrow we head back for the homestretch Tulelake, CA to Salt Lake City, UT. It’s a long one. No one has killed anyone yet, in fact, we all seem to be pretty good friends still. It will be good to be back home and in our own bed, but it will be sad to leave all of our wonderful family and all the fun sites we have seen. Our families have been great to us from Prineville to Tulelake and everything in between. I am thankful to have seen all we have seen; I feel like I have been able to soak up a wonderful portion of Shelli’s family history through the places we have visited and the amazing stories we have heard. I’m glad to have a place in all of this and it has been an exciting time.
Well, I am done for now, mostly. One more long day on the road and its back to the real world. Salt Lake City here we come…
Shelli and I after a day of climbing at Smith Rock just outside of Prineville. We were told it is one of the premier climbing locations in the world, it was pretty incredible.
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2 comments:
Sounds as if the whole motly crew had a great time "mostly". Glad we were part of it
Shelli these are such great pictures! Makes me want to go there? are those the rocks that are in the goonies? this is ashley from sds by the way
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