Family Trip 2021

Ghostman

Ambassador of the SuperNatural
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My wife and I took our youngest for a road trip this last week. We decided to just jump in the car and head down the Oregon Coast to see the Redwoods. We didn't plan much, but just figured we would find things along the way. The only thing that stressed me out was not knowing where we were going to either camp or rent a hotel room since we didn't reserve places since we really didn't know how far we were going to get.

Day 1: Seattle down the Oregon coast to a campsite we reserved for the night. The only campsite we reserved.

Fort Stevens Beach
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The campsite was pretty nice, right next to a gorgeous beach. The downside was our site was 10 feet from the highway. I did not sleep much, lol.

Day 2: We tried to hit a few of the site seeing spots along the coast. Devil's punchbowl, Thor's Well, Otter Rock, just to name a few. We ended up close to the Oregon/California border at the only Hotel room we could find. The room was brand new as they were remodeling the place.

Thor's Well
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Day 3: This was the part I was most excited about, the Redwood National Forest. We hit a few scenic routes and checked out two of the most popular destinations; Lady Bird Johnson National Monument, Jedediah State Park, Stout Grove Trail. All were awesome places to visit. A must see event. I could have spent the rest of my life in the Stout Grove and the Lady Bird Johnson Grove. Awe inspiring.

Lady Bird Johnson Grove Trail
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Day 4: after the Redwoods we headed inland, staying at a campsite that was almost completely empty of people. Once we got over the first pass, the temperature went from an average of 60 degrees up to 100. For the rest of the trip, our average temp during the day was around 98. The morning of the 4th day, we headed for our next destination, Black Rock Desert. As we were following Google Maps, we realized that we would have hit our destination at around 4pm, and would have to deal with the deep desert heat until night fell. Not exactly what we wanted to deal with. We rerouted down through Reno to burn up some time. We finally reached our campsite at 8pm which was perfect. The sun was sinking, and the temperature was beginning to drop down to 85 degrees. Manageable.

Our campsite on Black Rock Desert. The only reason we hit the desert was because my son was determined to do some night photography.
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Day 5: The day began with an awesome sunrise. We packed up and drove 92 miles down a dirt road to exit the desert on the North end and finally back to civilization. We left at 8am and drove straight through to Seattle to get home at 10:30pm. It was a very long day. 1929 miles round trip.

So many things happened along the way, we'll have stories to tell for ages. What an experience!!!

Morning sunrise over the camp. No one around for miles.
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Nice pics dude. Especially dig the redwood pic.

When I was a kid, my parents often took us almost the same route. Haven't been that way in ages now, but is a great idea for the next trip I take my family on. I bet my kids would stop fighting for a couple minutes to see the redwoods....I think...
 
Very cool roadtrip, Ghosty! Lincoln City has been on my radar for a couple of years now. Do you remember much about it when you drove through?
 
Very cool roadtrip, Ghosty! Lincoln City has been on my radar for a couple of years now. Do you remember much about it when you drove through?
Unfortunately very little. We hit Tillamook around 7pm and still had 2 hours to drive to our first campsite. After we left Tillamook, I was on a mission to reach the site.
 
Lincoln City has grown? Used to be an awesome place, went whale watching a couple times there. Is the D river still mostly a ditch?
 
Did you do the cheese factory tour?

Edit: apparently not,
yeah, we missed out. As we drive into town we saw a bunch of people sitting outside enjoying their ice-creams, but we hadn't eaten dinner yet. So we stopped in for a quick Subway order and the wife checked their website where the closed at 6pm.

What baffles me was that all along the coast, every place we checked out closed super early. It's July and these retail and restaurants were closing at like 6, 7 and 8pm. WTF? This is bread-and-butter time folks! One pizza shop we went to was the only place open in town and it was 7:55pm. They had a sign on the door that they were closing at 8pm, and I was thinking, I'm inside before closing, I'm getting my pizza.

That was eye-opening and aggravating.
 
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