This was my view at 8:00am this morning so I decided to leave the kids in the tent to sleep. They didn't even move with all my noise! Everyone woke up happy this morning either because I let them all sleep in or because we were picking up Dave today! I'm assuming it was mostly the latter.
I make a huge pile of pancakes and the we gobbled them all up. Dave wasn't flying in until just after noon so it was nice to not have to rush through our packing up. I was even able to take a shower - what a luxury!
We mailed a ginormous pile of post cards then we were off! It was time for an oil change again so that was our first stop once we got on the road. The guy informed me that I got a free vaccuum and car wash with my oil change. He realized the car wash probably wouldn't work with our cargo carriers and I told him I wouldn't torture him vaccuming out the mess that is the car we've been living in for a month. He was very appreciative and wished us, "Safe travels to the south, ya'll" as we drove off.
We were going to try to fit in a Trader Joe's stop before the airport but I didn't want to be stressed out with Dave's flight arriving a little early so we got gas and arrived a little early to the airport. It was nice to have the kids practice navigating us to where we needed to go from the parking garage. Every airport is different!
After about 20 minutes The Clarkes were all back together! Dave was loaded down with books for Brayden, activities for the girls, and a new sleep mat for me! It's a wonder he could fit any clothes in his bag!
The kids were talking 90 miles a minute trying to tell himi what we'd been doing the last few days. We stopped briefly for a resupply at Trader Joe's then headed to a Portland ice cream shop to celebrate. I'd found Cloud City ice cream earlier that morning and it definitely did not disappoint! I'd found and had recommendations of another Portland favorite I just didn't think my kids would be up for the quirky flavors. This ice cream shop had some delicious stand bys as well as a few quirky ones. Their dark chocolate ice cream is definitely the best I've ever tasted! Unforunately for me it wasn't what I ordered and I didn't even being to ask Dave to trade me!
We dangerously took our ice cream in the car, anxious to reach our next destination, Crater Lake National Park. We drove through miles and miles of wilderness which seemed to aclimate Dave to the woods just a bit. We kept seeing a glacier-covered peak in the distance and finally stopped at an overlook. We learned it is Diamond Peak, park of the Pacific Coast Trail and thought to be an extinct volcano.
We kept onward and before we knew it we reached the sign for Crater Lake. We had about 30 minutes left in our drive so I just assumed as we climbed up that we would simply be climbing to our campsite. Our jaws dropped as we reached the first lookout point of Crater Lake. I pulled across the road to stop so we could enjoy the view for a few minutes and take it all in. It was breathtaking and I don't think I have enough amazing adjectives to describe it.
The pictures can't even begin to do it justice. The water is a shade of blue that I've never seen before. I couldn't wait to see more!
But the kids could wait. They spotted snow and about 100 yards later we pulled over again to let them play in the snow. In August. Yep, it was obvious we were from Florida then!
Dave challenged them to hit him with a snowball. They tried and tried and as you can see Laney hit me instead!
It was very chilly so I grabbed my sweatshirt and hopped in the car while the kids made some kind of snow monster guy. I believe it was supposed to be a snowman but yeah, we're from Florida.
We finally made it to our site and met back up with Grammie. There were backpackers off the Pacific Coast Trail everywhere as this was a good stop for them for food, showers, and laundry.
We checked in and got set up in record time. Dave got in the groove with helping setup and cooking dinner at the same time. It sure is so nice to have another adult! We had a delicious dinner of grilled mahi mahi sandwiches and salad before we walked over to plan our next day with Grammie. We would be seeing the lake up close tomorrow!
