We made it to San Francisco

After the highly technical camping experience in the KOA campground by Olympic Park  we never were able to blog again till tonight (Sunday) at Phil and Joyce's house in San Francisco! We were also just super busy exploring and driving and trying to find camp sites in the middle of the night!

For those of you who have not heard CC was fine (we think she just needed a rest) but after that night of positive thinking she has not smoked from her back end again! Fingers crossed-because tomorrow we are heading to Yosemite and that is a pretty steep climb for CC who is almost my age! :)

So the adventure managed to continue in Washington because once the car was tested by a mini test drive for twenty minutes around Port Angeles in search of my sunglasses which I had lost in the craze of events. We had am incredible hike in the rainforest. The problem with the trails there is there are not many options. there are two very short hike's that are between 2-3 miles approximately and then there is the 17.5 mile hike to mount Olympus...well can you guess which one I wanted to do? Don't worry we saved that hike for another visit, although we did start on it and managed to do a total of about 7 miles round trip. We still got to see a lot of really interesting landscape with all kinds of neat waterfalls and contrasting settings like super rocky beaches on one side along the river and then dense rain forest on the other. We talked for an entire 4 hours and "we" ( well really Elena) shot tons of pictures which I know you will all want to see but putting pictures on is actually pretty complicated so you may have to see those in person!

One thing I did realize while we were walking is that walking is great!!! I think we forget how wonderful it can be to just go on a walk. So if you have not gone on a walk in a while try it, especially in the woods because it is really something! All the different wood smells and sounds and the thumping of your feet to the rhythm of your heart beat are really calming and exhilarating at the same time! I am sure if they have not already proved it they will some day show that walking diminishes the effect of aging...or some mumbo jumbo like that!

Anyway there is my random side note.

After words we wanted to make a straight shot for Oregon so after we packed up our tent we skipped through Oregon relatively quickly meeting some really nice people along the way including a crazy Canadian crabber whose camping site we stayed at and who lent us his pedal kayaks for an hour in exchange for the two of us "advertising" them for him by riding them around the bay. It was actually our best camping experience...well till the next one which was free (kind of) and even though we were there for less than 10 hours we saw the sun setting and the moon rising over the ocean, with Venus by their side.

Of course a lot happened on the way but this entry is already way to long and we are planning on waking up at a ridiculously early time tomorrow to get to Yosemite on time (a practice which we have done increasingly more of as the reality of how much we are trying to do has sunk in...)

So skip forward past a lot of really nice stops in cute little towns along the coast and some stressful curvy driving and picture the two of us driving into San Francisco at 8pm on Friday night, with Elena driving and me back-seat driving and the two of us singing  "when you are going to Saaan Fraaanciscooo be sure to..." (but of course we did not know the whole song so it was really a pretty painful sound and we were also dealing with the Californian drivers who did not seem to appreciate CC's 'maturity' or our desire to drive somewhat cautiously (a.k.a slowly) in one of the 2 left most lanes on the highway...all I can say is thank goodness for Tom Tom during that drive into the city because his robotic voice managed to calm me down a little and get us to where we needed to be!

San Francisco by Foot & Mouth

San Francisco has been amazing, and even more so Phil and Joyce and Sarah and Lizzy have been amazing. We all went out to a diner style breakfast the first morning with the most plates on the wall you have ever seen!!!! Then Elena and I went with Sarah and Joyce to her orthodontist on Union street ( a very upscale area...where I seriously resisted walking into a Ralph Lauren Store which was oh soooo cute!). Then Elena and I walked down to the water all up and down these incredibly steep hills that are impressive in pictures but more frustrating in reality! Elena really wanted to take a cable car but there was an hour long wait for them and everyone was packed in like sardines so we decided to  walk...in the end this turned out to be 1. great exercise 2. a great way to see the city 3. smart- because as we were walking to the trains after our whole day of adventure we saw an empty cable car with just the driver and talked our way into sitting on it and having an entire photo shoot on it! So we got the best of all sides!

We pretty much ate our way through San Francisco! Well, after walking up and down all those hills we were hungry!!! So we went to an Italian Bakery in the little Italy of North Beach as an appetizer and then to this really amazing, but from the outside rather unappealing, pizza place called Golden Boy's Pizza that we read about in the Lonely Planet book Elena brought, we had delicious pesto vegetarian pizza and sausage combination pizza and I got to try Hemp Beer- which I had never heard of but it was really really REALLY good...we actually ended up ordering another round of both pizza and beer. One would think you would be filled up after all of that...well we were but we still wanted to try so many things! So we searched deep down in our souls and made room for cappuccinos and hot spice milk at Cafe Trieste which is an eclectic little cafe in North Beach where we met very eclectic people... let's just leave it at that. We ended the night in the oldest bar in town which we think may have had both the oldest bar tenders and the oldest beer as well...but some pretty chill music and some great opportunities for people watching!

Today was a bit more relaxing we started the morning with a farmers market and stocked up for our trip with lots of yummies for the cool box and a full tummy of Indian food and Belgian waffles for breakfast- a surprisingly delicious combination. Later that day we walked around The Haight (sp?) where Lizzy goes to Urban High School- and it was a wacky area lots to see of both the people and the store's. We tried on some really cool old fashioned dresses and what a surprise?!-ate some more deliciousness which included hot chocolate, chocolate mint tea, and chocolate pudding! YUM! We finished the night off with maybe the best Chinese food I have ever had and a trip up to this hill where you can look down on the Golden Gate Bridge- drinking wine that Phil had made himself and I had actually seen being made while I visited him last October.

It has really been a great trip and I am really tired which is why this post will be un-edited but I would just like to thank all the people who have been so wonderful on our trip- it is all of you who have made it that much more magical ( and often have made it much more practical- considering we may not always think things through enough...)
I am going to bed for like six and half hours before we wake up so we can have lots more adventures!!!
Love to all
E&A

Olympic National Park

We left Seattle as early as possible for the Olympic Peninsula. We had a beautiful ride across on the ferry in the early morning and a really pretty drive up to Port Angeles with the help of our new friend TOM TOM ( who we adore even though he yells at us sometimes..oh don't worry TOM TOM is our GPS device care of Elena's parents).
As usual we were trying to fit way to much into one day and were determined to do two hikes today and one hike tomorrow. Our goal was to see Hurricane Ridge, spend some time in the Hot Springs of Sol Duc and make our way over to Ho Rain forest on the other side of the park. But the park is big...really big and all that turned out to be a little too much to squeeze into a whole day.

When we did finally go into the ranger station and try and figure out our routes we realized we may not have planned far enough ahead so we decided to enjoy one thing thoroughly rather than try to hurriedly see everything! We drove up as far as we could to Hurricane Ridge and it was beautiful, there we did a relaxed two hour hike further up Hurricane Hill. We saw so much wild life! We saw so many deers that by the end of the hike I was completely unfazed when the deer just walked right up to us on the trail. We also saw lots of pretty mountain birds whose names I do not know, and this beautiful mountain hare who came right up to Elena's feet and was twitching his ears for the camera. The weather was just beautiful, clear skies, sunny with crisp cool air, the perfect hiking climate.

During the hike up Elena was even teaching me some new Dutch phrases and helping me with my grammar! She wanted me to teach her something in return and I kindly reminded her that I had already taught her so many valuable lessons with my oh so infinite wisdom...and that if that was not good enough that I would teach her how to rock climb...so stay tuned!

On the way down the mountain we were trying to plan where to stay when the car started acting up. We got down fine but we are now thinking we may have to take CC to a mechanic tomorrow. However, we did talk to a few "car" people and they said it may have just been a tough climb for her and the change in temperature could have caused these problems. So we are now praying/crossing our finger/ thinking positively that these people are right and that we will not have to deal with CC and her "special needs" tomorrow.
Because we were worried about the car we ended up choosing a more central camp site rather than somewhere in the park. We actually decided on a KOA which Tim had told us was really cheap, and it has turned out to be really nice! For thirty dollars we got clean toilets and showers, a hot tub and pool and free internet access! We ended up having a great night, we set up our tent and jumped in the Hot tub and then ate our cold dinner followed by hot roasted SMORES and lots and lots of laughter (tonight we were the annoying neighbors)!!!

I will not pretend that Elena and I are experts at starting a fire and I think we burned more newspaper than anything else...but we have to have the semblance of a fire at least ONCE while we are camping!

Now Elena is fast asleep and I am typing on my blog in our tent!!! The wonders of modern camping...it may not be the romanticized wilderness experience but there is definitely something to be said for it!

Night everyone, we miss you and please think good/mechanically healthy and functioning thoughts for CC (our car)
loveeee
E&A

Grand Coulee Dam to Seattle

The first day "on the road" we had a lot to learn still; like how to sing (because the radio was broken), what to pack for a camping trip ( bringing breakfast and lunch foods along is not as handy when you have no utensils for your sandwhich and no bowls for your cereal!), Apparently you are also supposed to book camp sites in advance? (every site we spoke to said in a very cheeky voice that they "began booking in January", well Elena and I were SHOCKED we hadn't even thought of this trip in January!

Ultimately we did find a camp ground near Electric City that had two spot available which  they told us were not great spots and that we should check them out first, so we drive along all excited for our first campsite and it was a patch of gravel next to three other patches of gravel with lots of people and cars around....our excitment diminished but we went to go check the price because we were tired and hungry. It was 32 dollars!!!! What!? we asked for a discount but apparently four hours in a car with the windows down did not make us an appealing customer! So we asked if he knew any free campsites and he was kind enought to share that with us! So we ended up staying at a much cheaper camp site with a whole bunch of other cheap people.
The camp site was really nice, right on a lake and lots of other friendly looking cheap campers around us. So we washed up in the lake (with biodegradable  soap ofcourse) looking out at a beautiful sunset and ate a cold left over burrito for dinner! For dessert we got some yummy fresh peaches and nectarines from a fellow young camper who had picked them with her mom. We were clean, and full and ready for bed! We set up our tent and got into our sleeping bags...I would like to say I slept like a rock...but I did not for a few major reasons
1. We had VERY loud neighbours who were having riveting conversations about whether Elton John was gay when he was married,how many cars they owned (with detailed descriptions of each), when they did finally go to bed, it turned out they snored.
2. My air mattress had a leak and my back was right on top of a rock so the whole night I had dreams about being paralyzed
3. I really needed to use a washroom but I was detterred by the stench of the one at the camp site and the temperature outside of my sleeping bag.

Relatively well rested we got on the road early for Seattle. Our loud neighbours turned out to be very friendly and offered us tea and tried to help us fix CC (our car). The radio has been broken since we got it fixed last time and we were trying to replace a fuse that may have been broken. Anyway he saw us damsels in distress and came right over, but I did not want him to mess with it too much because CC is fragile and he was talking about the cooling system and radio being connected and I did not want to deal with a very over-used over-heated car in the middle of a curvy highway. So we decided to count our blessings with the free tea, free campsite, and a working car and be on our way!

We got to Seattle with little trouble, mostly because Tim and Kristy Harvey were guiding us the whole way and went as far as to come meet us where we were ( as we had taken the incorrect exit). On the way we had lunch on a really pretty river on a random road off the highway and it was so perfect (and looked so much like Twilight-which was set in Forks, Washington), we also had an amusing couple in front of us on a large leg of the journey who were dressed in bright orange on a bright orange motorcycle and side car!

Seattle was wonderful it was so nice to be staying with Tim and Kristy they took such good care of us, helped us find bus routes, dropped us off and picked us up from the bus and gave us a much needed hug when we arrived! We were so excited we had a bed to sleep in (even though we had only been camping for one whole night- we are so hard core) that we almost did not go into Seattle- but we just had to see it! we saw it all, the space needle (which Elena got directions for by describing at as a tall pointy thing with a donut around it). Well we were tired and besides her directions worked! We got there and we went all the way to the top we also saw Pike's market and our fair share of strange characters.

imagine this right side up- too tired to figure it out right now

So I think we did get a taste of Seattle in the short time we had and tommorrow we are off to olympic national park!
Till future adventures
E&A

My first blog post

Elena and I leave tomorrow for our road trip along the west coast! We still have a lot to do tonight!
- E&A