Day 1 (Portland)

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A much needed vacation for us... and a long time coming. Ivan and I have decided that we have got to see where we are from. Share it with each other. Also, Christopher is only getting older and soon, he'll be off working like us all and maybe not be able to travel with us... This first trip was my lovely state of California... I was born and raised out there for the first 28 yrs of my life... then I headed out East when I got pregnant with my son, Christopher. I've been back twice in the past 15 yrs. This was a much needed trip home. I wanted to show off the state that I love so much.



Ivan has always wanted to drive along PCH, a dream of his... and well, that is further up north than where I grew up... soooo, a quick trip home to see my parents and family, turned into the trip of a lifetime! In order to see as much as I wanted to show them, we had to arrange travel to accomodate. We actually flew into Portland, Oregon (as we wanted to see the Redwoods and also as much of the California coast as was possible)... We flew out of Philadelphia airport (needed to rent a car for that, as we were coming home to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton airport). The flights went well (layover in Chicago O'Hare airport) and we knew we were in for a fantastic trip when we got this view of Mt Hood.



Once we landed, we had to pick up our rental car... the car that would drive us all the way down to Southern California. Then a quick run over the river to a WalMart (seeing Mt St Helens and Mt Hood in our horizon... lovely) to pick up snacks for our next day... over 400 miles and Redwoods and Beaches were on the agenda. Stayed at the Holiday Inn - Portland Airport, which was comfortable. We were exhausted from our day of travel and needed rest for our busiest day of our trip...

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Photos

Mt Hood
Mt Hood as seen from the plan