On the road: Day 10, 11, & 12

Day 10

Aw, day 10 is the day Sid fell in love with San Francisco. I did, too. I'd only been there a few times and only remember Fisherman's Wharf so we played nerdy-tourists-in-a-car on day 10. First we drove down the hairpin section of Lombard Street along with a bunch of other nerdy tourists, then we headed towards Chinatown and on towards Market Street. Sadly, we didn't get into the Mission District at all. We headed into the Castro (is it The Castro?) and over to Haight-Asbury (a place my mother visited when she was pregnant with me which is the reason why I am her "wild child", right?). We then passed the Painted Ladies and drove towards and over the Golden Gate Bridge. Bye-bye San Francisco. Next time we'll stay much, much longer. (As Sid was saying how much he liked the city, Zoe was reminding us all that So. Cal is the only cool place and we are all weirdos if we don't agree.)

We had a long drive ahead and that pretty much sums up the rest of Day 10. After a stop at the busiest In-N-Out Burger ever (in Mill Valley), we drove and drove. Sadly, we had to zoom past Bodega Bay and wine country. We just missed The Trees of Mystery in Klamath but it was still light enough out to get a few photos with Babe and his anatomically correct Blue Ox. We pulled into Crescent City just as the sun was setting and settled into our cozy, retro motel, The Curly Redwood Lodge. Zoe loved this place. The floorplan was weird, the 3 beds were at angles and the seating area faced away from the tv. But there was something fun and quirky about it. And, hey, the entire motel was made out of one single tree. (Aw, poor tree.)

Day 10 photos (mouseover for titles, click to embiggen)
  
 
  

Day 11

We headed out early and made very few stops. The drive was gorgeous! Huge redwood trees everywhere, bridges and rivers, oh my! We ate lunch at Cornucopia in Eugene, OR. I'd only been in Eugene once before and that time it was just off of I-5. This time we headed into the city center. Very cute! The food at Cornucopia was yummy (excellent vegetarian options, too) and their beer list and prices were great (because halfway through a day's drive one must drink beer, right?) After hitting a bit of a snag in traffic we arrived in Portland. I'd booked 2 rooms in the Ace Hotel. It was a little pricey but SO worth it. I love this place. Cool decor. Old building. A great lobby and coffee shop attached. A turntable in our room. And one block from Powell's!

Robert had been eagerly awaiting our arrival in Portland so he could sip some delicious Copacetic IPA at Amnesia Brewing Company (it's possibly the only reason he'd agreed to take this long road trip, me saying "beer at the end! beer at the end!") so we ditched the kids (who sat in their cool room, eating Whole Foods pizza and then wandered over to Powell's) and drove out to North Portland. We were hungry. And thirsty. And very excited (because food! beer! Portland!). The last time we went to Amnesia we sat at the bar, shared a pitcher of beer and ate spicy sausage links. When we arrived this time around we went straight to the bar, smiles on our faces and asked for the Copacetic. They were out of Copacetic! We ordered pints of one of their lesser beers and sat outside in the jammed eating area, pouting.

So then our night went from happy to crappy just like that. We decided not to eat because the bartender said we might be able to get Copacetic elsewhere in town. Our new plan was to drive back to the hotel and walk to food and drink. Did I mention that I was hungry? I get grumpy when I'm hungry. We drove back into town and discovered that the hotel's lot was full. For the next 20 minutes we fought like an old married couple (what?!). Where to park? Street or lot? I begged for street parking. We hadn't even found a place to eat yet! No, Robert says, if we street park he has to get up in the morning and move the car. Fine, another lot. Only, another lot's credit card reader wouldn't work. We drove around and around and finally settled on street parking.

We walked around the Pearl District and settled on Henry's. How bad could it be with that many beers on tap? As soon as we walked in I was turned off by the place. 20-something hipsters everywhere. I felt like I was in King's Hardware on a Friday night. Oh well, I was too hungry to try another place. We sat down, waited forever to be helped and when I finally had a chance to order, I ordered the biggest Bombay Sapphire martini they would make me. Perhaps I was just drunk from the martini, but the place turned out to not be so bad after all. They had awesome happy hour food. I ordered a mac and cheese for $3 and it was huge. HUGE. A martini and mac and cheese? Are you kidding me? I was giggling with happiness. I'm sure Robert was relieved with my change in mood. He never did get his Copacetic.

We returned to our room and watched a crazy B movie about a man and a dozen hot women, stuck in the jungle. Man gets bit by spider. Man turns into a big ugly spider. Man kills hot women.

Day 11 photos (mouseover for titles, click to embiggen)
 
 

Day 12

We loaded up the car and headed to Powell's where we purchased many books. We then said good bye to our road trip and headed home to Seattle.

Day 12 photos (mouseover for titles, click to embiggen)
  

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Thoughts: I like road trips but this one had too many destinations in too few days. We missed a lot of things along the way because we didn't have time to stop.

Also, I had this idea that I'd regularly post photo updates on Facebook so I used my phone to take photos quite a bit. That was a dumb decision. I have more crappy cell phone photos than decent ones (taken with my regular camera).