Honeymoon in Oregon

As I'm sure you know, I just got married!  We had such a wonderful wedding and spent the night at a nearby cabin.  Sunday afternoon we drove down to Leesburg, Virginia where we had met up after Ben came back from his trip to South Africa almost 3 years ago.  We had dinner at The Wine Kitchen, which was one of our only options because a lot of things were closed, and I had the most delicious and flavorful meal I have ever had: a scallop and mint pea risotto.  Seriously, I would go back there and eat that if I could.  We flew out of Dulles on Monday and headed to Portland, Oregon.  "Why would you go to Portland?" was something many people asked or so said the looks on their faces.  I hope the following pictures show you why.  They don't completely capture the beauty that is Oregon, but Ben and I tried our hardest.  It was a perfect honeymoon.

Our first stop was Portland where we got our rental car from Hertz (a 2014 Chevy Captiva, which I highly recommend) and explored the city a little.  Then we headed a little west to Multnomah Falls.  All our friends who live or visited the Pacific Northwest had always talked about its beauty, and it did not disappoint.

They had a cute little gift shop and we found a nice mug to add to our large collections of mugs.  If you ever come visit and drink coffee, chances are you'll see that mug.  Ben really likes it.

We drove south then to Coos Bay.  It's about a 4 1/2 hour drive, but it was one of the most beautiful drives.  The tall pines trees, the surrounding mountains, and the pleasure of Ben's company and "Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me! The NPR News Quiz" made for a joyous ride.  We stopped here at one of the first scenic points looking down at the rivers and valleys. 

One cool thing about Oregon was that they have tiny, drive-thru espresso places on the side of the road.  Our favorite is Dutch Bros. Coffee.  They make amazing drinks.  

Our cabin was called Below The Falls Lodge and it was so beautiful!  Shane Daugherty, the owner, built the cabin out of wood on the property.  It's about a half hour west of Coos Bay and we drove tiny backroads through beautiful woods.

Ben loved the propane stove.

Our second day in Coos Bay we headed over to the downtown part.  We had lunch at a cool seafood restaurant and then had Italian for dinner.

On the boardwalk was a history of Coos Bay and the surrounding area.

In the afternoon, we went exploring and came to Sunset Bay.  We didn't intend on going there, but we ended up spending around 3 hours exploring the tide pools and rocks.

The rocks were very smooth and good for skipping.

The urchins here were really cool!  If you touched part of it, it would close.

There were many snails as well.  Some of them had really beautiful shells.

Ben's goal was to catch a crab.  This is the first one he found.  This one was too tiny, so he wanted to find a bigger one.  

I was sad because I was trying to get around this huge rock (upon which Ben is standing) but I had the camera on my back at one point and after giving it to Ben, was stuck.  I did eventually make it around the rock, but not without almost falling in.

Ben explored farther than me and found some neat starfish, along with these little channels where water would flood in and then rush back out.

Ben managed to nab a big crab!  Well, big for where we were.  Those little buggers are fast and their pinchers hurt (as Ben found out).

The next day we stayed home and decided to check out the Golden and Silver Falls about a mile up the road.  It was a long and tiring hike, but it was worth it!  We traveled alongside a creek and up the mountains and it was beautiful.

I'm not sure why, but this is one of my favorite shots of our whole trip.

This is Silver Falls.  It was very mesmerizing and we probably could've spent much longer there because the falls go on for a long time.

It was hard to see all of the falls because of the foliage and lack of trail, but it was so beautiful.  

We headed down to California to the National Redwood Forests and the drive alone was worth it.  We followed the Pacific Coast most of the way, and the clash of the mountains with the oceans was just breathtaking.  We stopped for about a half hour at Gold Beach, OR to check out the beautiful ocean.  

We found these weird, bulbous things.  Still don't know what they are.

We went down to the Trees of Mystery.  It was kind of a tourist trap thing, but we got to see some neat trees and we helped some lost children.

This picture doesn't seem that interesting, until you see me at the very bottom looking up at the tree.

We rode the Sky Trail up the mountain to a lookout point.

From the lookout point we could see the Pacific.

On our way back we stopped at Meyers Creek Beach.

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Here are pictures of our cabin on our last day.

This staircase was built around this very old tree.

The owner had a guestbook and Ben and I both signed it.  I added a little sketch of Oregon.

We headed from Coos Back back up to Portland on Tuesday so that we could spend the afternoon and evening in the city before flying out on Wednesday.  There was a beautiful rose garden on the mountain.

There were hundreds of roses scattered everywhere throughout the garden.  I didn't even know that many types of roses exist!  The smell of all the roses perfumed the air and was very relaxing.

Our honeymoon was just perfect.  After being long-distance for 4 years, it was nice to get away and have it be just us.  We made so many memories and had the time of our lives.  Hopefully we will get to go back to the beautiful Pacific Northwest.