Idaholes and Oregon Craters

Dill has often talked about going to the Fins in Idaho to climb. It was sort of on the way to the Pacific Northwest, where we will spend our summer, so we made a slight detour so that he could get his fix of climb time. The Fins is out in the middle of nowhere. The access road only exists for some local electric company and is mostly loose gravel at a steady incline. In warmer weather, cars can easily overheat and you need to have 4-wheel drive to get to the climbing and camping. But all we had was Vanna, and she(as part of the dream team with Driver Dill) did her best to get us to the lower parking area, which is less than ideal for camping and sets us up for a rather grueling approach to the climbing walls, where the climbing itself is no walk in the park. Needless to say, not a lot of climbing was done by me, but Dill got his fill and then some.

Approaching the Fins!

Approaching the walls!

View of our itty bitty van from the wall.. that's a steep hike.

All the climbers.

Organizing frenzy on a rest day

Home improvement, taking inventory

The best way to ensure you get all of that goodness in your oatmeal, yum!

Our camp setup, complete with rocks under the passenger side tires to make the bed as level as possible. (It still wasn't.)

Big ol' rattlesnake at the trailhead on the hike out on our last day. My very first rattlesnake encounter!

Nothing but nuclear laboratories out here.

From the Fins we continued on to the Craters of the Moon National Monument, where we felt like we were on a different planet. It was really cool to see little pops of color in mostly dark, dry rock. As we walked along the trails we could hear the rocks and soil clinking at our feet due to it's high metallic content. The highlight of out visit was walking through Indian Tunnel, which took us underground through beautiful caves.

When in Idaho, eat potatoes!

Next up was Sun Valley/Ketchum. Neither of us knew much about the area other than that Hemingway lived there, once we got there we could see why. Ketchum is an adorable town with a gorgeous backdrop of the Sawtooth National Forest, where we camped for a few days and enjoyed ourselves.

I was hoping I wouldn't have to use my mosquito net on this trip, but here we are...

A home is never-ending project.

The ever so fancy Ketchum Library, where we scored a bunch of free books!

Cute town square, where we had a lovely lunch

Arugula salad with anchovies, walnuts, feta cheese, red pepper, olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Smoked oysters on the side. Yum!

But no ice cream for me.

The swankiest Starbucks we had ever seen.

Pretty pretty campsite

To further satisfy our crater cravings, we powered through to Oregon, to Crater Lake, another place on my list of must-visits. Despite it being early in the season and the roads being open for only 1 mile on the rim with cloudy skies above, it did not disappoint.

On one of our hottest driving days, we stopped for ice cream sandwiches. A delicious, cheap alternative to AC.

Passing through some sand dunes...

Which turned into an evergreen forest...

Then got snowier...

And wetter...

Et voilà! The lake!

Another installment of the parking lot dinner series

We headed to Portland, stopping along the Rogue River to see waterfalls and soak in hot springs. Our friends Jodi (a Hokie!) and Travis in Portland hosted us for a fun weekend evading the rain and chasing mountain views and sunshine. On our way out of the city we made a pitstop and saw more friends, Weston and Natalie (more Hokies) who recently made the move from Seattle to Portland. Thanks PDX Hokie friends for your hospitality!

Ominous clouds..

...made for a pretty cool sunset. Ah, the Pacific Northwest.

Dill having a wet workout session in the Silver Falls State Park.

One of the many impressive waterfalls in the park..

We stopped at Umpqua Hot Springs (did not take pictures, for everyone's sake), which had surprisingly hot water, provided a nice break from the cold wetness, aside from the mosquitos and large crowds of people. Our last stop before the city was the Mount Angel Abbey, which has a library designed by Alvar Aalto, a celebrated Finnish architect. Upon arrival we were told to visit the museum nearby ("You just have to see it," they said), which dropped heavy hints that we were getting close to the weirdness that is Portland.

So. Much. Taxidermy.

Put a bird in it!

More ominous clouds ahead, full of rain.

It takes a village(or just Jodi and Travis) to help Vanna park in the city.

Success!

We drove out of the rainy city to get some sunshine and found this mountain.

Just drinking beer and looking at Mount Hood, no big deal. Only in Parkdale!

Sunshine came to Portland the next day so we biked around town.

And we watched people race dragon boats. Fun fact: these boats were a gift to Portland from their sister city in China.

Another Portland fun fact: there are no grills in Laurelhurst Park, despite what their website says. So we had to improvise by recreating these disposable grills we saw everywhere while we were honeymooning in Denmark, Sweden and Norway.

The result: slow-cooked sausage and veggies! Yum! Thank you, patrons of Laurelhurst Park, for not caring.

Now finally, we have made it to Seattle for a temporary homecoming. We'll be spending the summer in the Pacific Northwest -- Leavenworth, Squamish, Olympic Peninsula, to name a few spots. More adventures to come!