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I slept out in Dad's friends RV that evening (Their lj is ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lorihedbutler though there's not much there atm.). It was nice and my first time sleeping in one. I woke up a little after 7 and found breakfast being prepared inside the house. Once again, we were fed copious amounts of food - eggs, pancakes, sausage, toast, and bacon. The bacon was fantastic. After that, we all got our stuff together and drove towards Victoria and Buchart Gardens. I ended up in their car while Dad talked to one of their sons, so I was treated to a very funny trip (Dad's friend is quite the joker) and it was a GPS led trip so of course we ended up driving through a lot of backroads. They were entertainingly bumpy. About an hour and half later we arrived. The gardens are beautiful and while I've seen smaller gardens that are equal to or better than these, the size and scope of these gardens was very impressive. I think my favourite part was the sunken garden but the Japanese garden was quite lovely - it was interesting since you could see the Japanese influence on the design but it wasn't as minimal as I've come to expect of Japanese gardens. Also, no carp. *pout* We all had a good time, and finished off the outing with lunch at White Spot (which is rapidly becoming my favourite chain restaurant). I had a open turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce sandwich and a strawberry-vanilla shake with real strawberries. Nice stuff. After that, it was time to say goodbye. I really enjoyed the visit and it was a treat to stay with some locals rather than in a hotel.
The ferry over seemed to take forever, probably because I developed a headache from all the reading we did waiting to board the ferry, then getting on the ferry, then during the 1 1/2 hour trip on the ferry. We were still in Canada when we got off (since the ferry we'd planned on taking only left once a day and in the morning), so we had to go through the border crossing which took awhile then drive all the way down to Tacoma before we stopped for the night. I was really cranky by the time we hit the hotel at 9:30 pm, but at least I slept well.
Day 25 -
I slept until 8:30 today, which is the latest I've slept this entire trip. Scary. We dawdled in the morning cause both of us had things we had to do on the internet (like book our hotel for the evening...) and I got distracted by the nice breakfast (Best Western is winning the best hotel with decent prices on this trip, hands down.). We finally set off around 10 which meant we reached the exit for Mount St. Helens around lunch time. We ate at Pepers 49er Restaurant which was very... themed in decour, but also quite local. I liked the giant pumpkin with the name of the place carved in it. After a nice lunch, we drove to the Mt. St. Helens visitor centre, watched the movie, read up on the eruption and debated whether to drive the 50 miles to Jackson's Ridge. We decided to do so, though we'd have gone back earlier if we'd found another closer place to get a good view. As it was, this time of year with all the low lying clouds, it's pretty much impossible to get a good view anywhere other than Jackson's Ridge. It's also totally worth the drive. You get a perfect view of the snow touched crater and the mud flows beneath the mountain. There are still tons of white-bleached skeletons of trees in the area surrounded by hardy wild flowers. We watched the movie which was pretty good then climbed up the trail to get a better view. By then, the wind was blowing quite strongly and we were freezing, as shown by this photo. Our cheeks are red now, I guess from the wind since there was hardly any sun. Once I pulled Dad away from photographing (he filled up a 2GB chip), we headed down the mountain. It was five by the time we hit route 5 again. We agreed to stop in Portland for dinner, and to make a long story short, we'd estimated only spending an hour at the volcano where really we spent more like four, so we got into our hotel around 10pm, which we both agree is far too late, and the only reason you guys are getting a post is because I wrote this in the car.
Tomorrow, we're off to Crater Lake and then the redwoods. We will be getting to our hotel before 8pm if I have any say in the matter.
lorihedbutler though there's not much there atm.). It was nice and my first time sleeping in one. I woke up a little after 7 and found breakfast being prepared inside the house. Once again, we were fed copious amounts of food - eggs, pancakes, sausage, toast, and bacon. The bacon was fantastic. After that, we all got our stuff together and drove towards Victoria and Buchart Gardens. I ended up in their car while Dad talked to one of their sons, so I was treated to a very funny trip (Dad's friend is quite the joker) and it was a GPS led trip so of course we ended up driving through a lot of backroads. They were entertainingly bumpy. About an hour and half later we arrived. The gardens are beautiful and while I've seen smaller gardens that are equal to or better than these, the size and scope of these gardens was very impressive. I think my favourite part was the sunken garden but the Japanese garden was quite lovely - it was interesting since you could see the Japanese influence on the design but it wasn't as minimal as I've come to expect of Japanese gardens. Also, no carp. *pout* We all had a good time, and finished off the outing with lunch at White Spot (which is rapidly becoming my favourite chain restaurant). I had a open turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce sandwich and a strawberry-vanilla shake with real strawberries. Nice stuff. After that, it was time to say goodbye. I really enjoyed the visit and it was a treat to stay with some locals rather than in a hotel. The ferry over seemed to take forever, probably because I developed a headache from all the reading we did waiting to board the ferry, then getting on the ferry, then during the 1 1/2 hour trip on the ferry. We were still in Canada when we got off (since the ferry we'd planned on taking only left once a day and in the morning), so we had to go through the border crossing which took awhile then drive all the way down to Tacoma before we stopped for the night. I was really cranky by the time we hit the hotel at 9:30 pm, but at least I slept well.
Day 25 -
I slept until 8:30 today, which is the latest I've slept this entire trip. Scary. We dawdled in the morning cause both of us had things we had to do on the internet (like book our hotel for the evening...) and I got distracted by the nice breakfast (Best Western is winning the best hotel with decent prices on this trip, hands down.). We finally set off around 10 which meant we reached the exit for Mount St. Helens around lunch time. We ate at Pepers 49er Restaurant which was very... themed in decour, but also quite local. I liked the giant pumpkin with the name of the place carved in it. After a nice lunch, we drove to the Mt. St. Helens visitor centre, watched the movie, read up on the eruption and debated whether to drive the 50 miles to Jackson's Ridge. We decided to do so, though we'd have gone back earlier if we'd found another closer place to get a good view. As it was, this time of year with all the low lying clouds, it's pretty much impossible to get a good view anywhere other than Jackson's Ridge. It's also totally worth the drive. You get a perfect view of the snow touched crater and the mud flows beneath the mountain. There are still tons of white-bleached skeletons of trees in the area surrounded by hardy wild flowers. We watched the movie which was pretty good then climbed up the trail to get a better view. By then, the wind was blowing quite strongly and we were freezing, as shown by this photo. Our cheeks are red now, I guess from the wind since there was hardly any sun. Once I pulled Dad away from photographing (he filled up a 2GB chip), we headed down the mountain. It was five by the time we hit route 5 again. We agreed to stop in Portland for dinner, and to make a long story short, we'd estimated only spending an hour at the volcano where really we spent more like four, so we got into our hotel around 10pm, which we both agree is far too late, and the only reason you guys are getting a post is because I wrote this in the car.
Tomorrow, we're off to Crater Lake and then the redwoods. We will be getting to our hotel before 8pm if I have any say in the matter.
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