Monday, July 06, 2009

Beverly Beach, Crater Lake, Shasta, Bumpass Hell and Lassen

We tacked a few days onto the Independence Day Holiday and took last week as our summer vacation.



We left K&M at the Golden Gate Bridge,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and drove north through the Central Valley (it was hot there!)

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


Late that night, we arrived in Beverly Beach State Park, a lovely spot just a few miles north of Newport, OR. We spent the next few days enjoying the cold Oregon sun,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


exploring tide pools,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


drawing in the sand,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and camping kid-style.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


It turns out Oregon Coast is a cold and windy place in the summertime,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


but we found ways to enjoy ourselves,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and even managed to fly this kite with a considerable amount of skill.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


We warmed up at the coffee shop,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and parted ways, with O and I driving east to Crater Lake.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


Crater Lake is very blue. Do you know why?

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


Olivia tried to find out by taking a swim,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


but it turned out the only way to really understand the blueness of the lake was to jump in.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


Yeah. Pretty awesome.

Crater Lake also has a lot of mosquitoes this time of year, so we spent a lot of time in here:

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


To avoid the mosquitoes we drove south, around Mount Shasta (which, incidentally, makes Chris' Top 5 Mountains list),

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and went swimming in Lassen Volcanic National Park.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


Lassen is also a pretty volcano,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


with a lot of snow,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


and a place called Bumpass Hell,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


which is like a mini-Yellowstone.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


The summertime meadows were beautiful.

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


We ended our trip with a climb up 10,500 foot Mount Lassen,

From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website


From West Coast Road Trip for Website
and drove home.

5 comments:

marta said...

there is so much awesomeness here.

Bill Ehlenbach said...

Great pics. I particularly enjoyed the one of Bethany on the verge of getting toppled by the wind. Crater Lake looks gorgeous!

Katie said...

Wow! What an incredible adventure...great pictures...

Roxanne said...

Those girls are so cute!!! (of course that includes Olivia ;)

So, why is the lake so blue???

Bonita said...

what a great trip! Next time you two are in SC, look us up, we would love to hang out/catch up ; )