California to Oregon Road Trip

Sometimes you need a change of scenery for your life. That was me a few years ago when I moved to San Diego, and now the time has come for my soul-twin and non biological sister to move ironically to where I came from. To Portland, Oregon!

In retrospect it was a terrible idea showing her how wonderful the PNW is. ::sigh::

This was a quick and dirty 3 day 2 night trip to get Drea up to Portland in time to pick up her keys on Saturday, and start work Monday. WAT. I know. Also this was the week I summited Mt. Whitney in one day and then figured since I was already in LA it was convenient to just keep going North. I know that sounds dumb, moving on.

Day 1 LA > San Francisco

Pack the rest of Drea’s shit in her Mini and hit the road.

Elephant Seal Beach

(0:14 – 0:18)

This wasn’t technically planned, but easy to see the sign and pull off for a looksy and these ginormous creatures.

San Francisco

(0:25 – 0:32)

The Bay Area isn’t normally my cup of tea what with it’s vertical streets and all. But Drea’s brother’s place and puppies were delightful. And I love me some creepy ominous fog.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDbSQcOMzdu/

Day 2 San Francisco > Eureka

Bowling Ball Beach

(0:41 – 0:50)

*technically* I’m not sure we really made it here. We didn’t see these giant bowling ball like rocks, but the tide was pretty high. We did climb down some treacherous rope-ladder-situation which felt dangerous and didn’t die though, so we still considered it a successful adventure.

Glass Beach

(0:51 – 1:00)

This place we definitely made it to after stopping for a beer in town. So Fort Bragg is what established this little coastal city. I guess back in the day before we knew what being environmentally conscious was, we would just throw all of our shit into the ocean off a cliff by Fort Bragg. This included whole cars, waste, and glass bottles. Because of tides the garbage would eventually made it back to shore – in particular the glass bottles. Overtime though the glass was smoothed over and became part of the beach.

It was really beautiful at one time, there are images of really colorful beaches. When we went you could definitely see the old glass, but it seems like it’s been picked over from tourists. Funny how we both created and also destroyed this little tourist attraction.

Chandelier Drive Thru Tree

(1:05 – 1:18)

If you have every wanted to drive through the base of a tree – YOU ARE IN LUCK. A lot of these lovely redwoods have been falling it seems, but the Chandelier tree is still intact.

We did some drive up car camping here, it was really conveniently located along our road trip route.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BI_u4OQDzgw/

Day 3 Eureka > Portland

Trees of Mystery

(1:20 – 1:55)

YOU NEED TO GO HERE IT’S QUIRKY AND MAGICAL.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BJBUZJZDXO8/

There was not a lot of filming in Portland once we crossed the state line. It was mostly about bee lining to Drea’s apartment building to get her keys, and then trying not to feel a lot of feelings about leaving her up there.

In sum

You really need to take more than one road trip to see all of the West Coast.
Friends that you can spend 3 days in a car with, are good friends.
Growing up and away is hard.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BQWoJ5Tlk2s/