Portland and the Oregon coastline

Seattle was fun, but I was itchin' to get to Oregon.  Being there once before, I knew it was going to be gorgeous, green, and of course rainy.  But that was okay, we were able to work around it and we weren't going to let it spoil our fun.

There are so many cool bridges there too. In order to utilize them as much as possible, I'd want to live on the north end of town, because downtown as well as the markets are on the south end... and of course, because going over bridges is fun fun fun!!!

Once we were settled in at our island oasis campground (which meant even more bridge crossing) we decided to hit the city.  Our first destination was the Saturday market under one of the bridges.  I believe it's a place where artists can set up for free and sell their goods.  I'll definitely be setting up here to sell my jewelry once we move here for good.

We saw "Portland's living room" which is a big park in the middle of downtown.  When we arrived, there were crowds of people there and most of them were dressed up like zombies with fake blood and scary faces.  Come to find out, there was a reenactment of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" right there in the park.  Too many people though so I wasn't able to get a picture.  I guess all those t-shirts we saw that said "keep Portland weird" were starting to make sense. :)

We did a little indoor shopping and then headed over to the Pearl District to Deschutes Brewery.

Scott and I had a beer and shared a pizza while the girls had homemade mac & cheese.  It was a friendly atmosphere in a super neat neighborhood.  We walked through China Town and a few other districts as well and it all solidified our decision to move here permanently.

Oh!  The leaves here were really pretty too!  It's been nice to catch autumn all over again.

We took a drive around town to see the different neighborhoods and Scott made a point to check out the Burnside Bridge Skate Park.  It was dark out and in a bit of a spooky neighborhood, so he stayed in the car.  Supposedly that's where the "pros" skate.  Whatever :)

The next morning, Scott hooked up the trailer in the pouring rain so that we could get back on the road to cruise the coast line.

We were stalled for about an hour due to a traffic accident just ahead of us where someone was air lifted off.  If we wouldn't have stopped to get gas, that could've been us.  Scary.

Once we hit Lincoln City, we got our first glimpse of the Pacific Ocean.

Maria was in heaven.

It was windy and cold so we didn't stay out long before heading into the trailer to make lunch.

The seagulls here are much beefier than Lake Superior seagulls.  Must be all that seafood.

We crossed many more bridges

until we came to sea lion cave.  We weren't going to stop but were so happy we did.  There were really sea lions at sea lion cave!!  I wasn't able to get a picture because they were pretty far away, but we could still see and hear them.  It was pretty neat.

We're still on the coast and heading towards Redwood State Park in California.  There's so much more shoreline to be seen and more pictures to be taken.

The laundry is done and hopefully the trailer is all packed up by the time I get back. But not before a quick pit stop at Starbucks on my way back through town.

More soon!!