We have had a great time in the first 2 plus days of our vacation to the Pacific Northwest. The boys have loved seeing new things and Greg and I have had a great time hanging out with each other and our kids.
We flew into Portland on Sunday morning. It was really pretty cool to fly right past Mt. Hood and to be able to see the top of the mountain above the clouds from the plane.
Once we landed, we were below the clouds and it remained mostly cloudy until this afternoon (and somewhat cold and super humid). After leaving the airport, we headed to a nearby restaurant that was featured on the Food Network's Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives - we had a great brunch - Greg had a some sort of Sicilian hash and I had sweet potato biscuits and gravy (the boys loved their pancakes). After lunch, we drove to the Oregon coast to Cannon Beach and Escola State Park. It was a beautiful drive and it is amazing to see the incredibly dense and ancient the forests that are here.
We hiked down to the beach - which ended up being a bigger hike than we expected - but the boys did great and it was really a beautiful hike through the forest. It was a about 1 1/2 miles from the car to the beach through the thick forest, steep hills (both up and down), and lots of mud - but it was worth it in the end to let the boys play on the beach.
We came across this giant tree along the way - the boys thought it was really cool to be able to stand inside the giant tree trunk.
There were several fairly steep drop-offs along the way, but the views were amazing.
All 3 boys, once again, loved being able to throw rocks into the water.
Part of the reward for the hike down to the beach was to view the tide pools that are in the rocks along the beach. The boys loved being able to climb all over and around them to get closer to the edge of the ocean.
It was really cool to see tons of starfish clinging to the side of the rocks and along the beach waiting for the high tide to come back in.
We also saw this little guy - not really sure if he was alive or dead, we didn't get too close to find out if his pinchers worked or not
Ryan loved to stand on the beach and let the tide come in over his feet. At first, he did try and outrun the water, but it wasn't much of an effort and he ended up getting his tennis shoes thouroughly soaked - he had to wear his flip flops the next 2 days waiting for his shoes to dry out. It wasn't much of a fun 1 1/2 mile hike back up to the car in wet shoes for him.
Luke didn't stomp through the water quite as much, but he also got quite wet. I did have their flip flops with me in my backpack, but they ran into the ocean so quickly that there wasn't much of a point in changing into them.
Ryan also drug his jacket through the ocean water and it was so humid that it was no where near dry enough to wear the next day. He was pretty cold so he got to wear Greg's jacket - he thought that was pretty cool.
The next day, we went to the Lewis and Clark National Park and then drove through Washington to Seattle. The boys took a nice long nap - it had been a very busy 24 hours for them at this point.
The boys were so excited to swim in the hotel pool when we got to Seattle last night. We swim at our own pool 3 or 4 times a week, but there is something about a plain hotel pool that seems so much cooler than our pool with a slide and diving board.
One of the great things about swimming last night was the boys being able to swim with their Daddy. They loved it when Greg launched them into the air over and over agin.
So far we have had a great time. We spent some time in downtown Seattle today and took the boys to a couple of parks. We have some fun stuff planned in the next few days - including going to the hotel pool (which is probably the boys' favorite thing so far).
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