On with the trip - Going to Washington then Oregon

Multnomah Falls and Jumping on Boulders

Multnomah Falls and Columbia River

Leaving Canada was sad for us. We loved it there - especially the cool weather. We started the day going through Kootenay National Park. This took us into British Columbia. It was a beautiful drive. This is actually where we saw two black bears in different areas. We also came across a car accident. We were stuck for over an hour waiting for an accident that was 5 miles ahead of where we were stuck. It was a long and tedious wait. We then were slowly able to get on our way. This made the boarder or getting into the US a little busier, but not too bad. We had to give up our oranges at the boarder because foreign citrus is not allowed in among other things. We were then on our way. Our drive was quite pleasant until we reached eastern Washington, then everything was dry and yellow. We arrived in Spokane in the late afternoon and the kids and I let dad rest and went swimming at the hotel pool. It was a cold pool and we didn't like that but swam anyway. We then ventured out for dinner. We decided to go a little upscale and ate at a nice Italian restaurant. It was pretty good. Justin didn't care for the Lasagna, but my Calazone was delicious. They also had a pretty good kids menu that the kids liked. Mackay got cheese pizza and Tyler had Mac and Cheese. After dinner we took a little walk on the riverfront. It was a nice cool evening and we enjoyed our walk. The rivers there generate power to the city. They had nice bridges and walkways that crossed over the river in several places. We were so tired that evening that we crashed.


The next day we were off to Oregon. The drive wasn't that spectacular, but we did follow the Columbia River almost all of the way. It is a huge river and it was fun to see the big barges, people water sailing, the dams, and a few bridges that lowered and went up as the barges and other boats went through.


We stopped and Multnomah Fall, which are about a 1/2 hour from Portland. It is such a massive waterfall. We needed some exercise so we took the 1.8 mile hike to the top. At the top it looked over the falls. It is quite a drop. In the distance we could still see the Columbia River and we also stopped and played at the creek that feeds into the fall. The kids and Justin had a good time jumping the large boulders in the creek.


We drove to Beaverton, Oregon after that and were welcomed by my college room mate Stef and her family. We spent a nice relaxing evening with them.