The Redwoods

Monday, June 21

When I was in first grade, each student was given a United States coloring book. I remember the pages for California, with the picture of a vehicle driving through a big, redwood tree. I remember thinking that driving through a tree would be about the coolest thing ever. Today, we stepped into the coloring book page... only it was way, way more amazing in real life!

I'm not a huge fan of the vast, open spaces of the west. Oh, it's amazing to drive through and see them -- the miles of empty, flat land where you can see forever; the rocks and mountains rising up in the distance; the high, barren hills with rows of towering white windmills, where the only colors to be seen are earth tones. But I always look around and wonder, "How could you live in a place with no trees?"

I think my favorite thing so far has been seeing the Redwoods. 

Our first stop was my little first grade dream come true. The lady at the booth warned us that we wouldn't fit through with our carrier on top, but that was ok. Just seeing it was good enough for us. 

The convertible made it through a little more easily than the van I caught on video that scratched its mirror!

Are you counting the family pictures? At home, getting one photo is a major undertaking; on vacation, it's become

 kind of a game. 

The next stop along our way was Humboldt Redwoods State Park. Avenue of the Giants auto tour had 8 stops along its route, but we only checked out the first one. Stepping into those woods was like taking the first spoonful of the most delicious dessert you can think of. I wanted to hang up a hammock and just lay there for hours, soaking up the beauty and silence. 

Just unbelievably beautiful. 

After we got to our motel, and ate a cobbled together supper, we all headed out to play some disc golf. The Redwood Curtain Disc Golf course is not one we will soon forget. Amazing. 

I kept saying "it's not even worth taking pictures" and then going ahead 

and taking one more...

Chris stuck his disc right in this tree!

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Tuesday morning we headed for Oregon. It felt like we spent a lot of time stopped in road construction along  the way! We are spending the rest of this week visiting friends, so if you don't hear from us for a while, it's not because we've fallen off the face of the earth....