Oregon Part 4

There are 1000 places you should see before you die, at least according to Patricia Schultz.

Crater Lake is one of them on that list. After having been there twice now, I absolutely agree with her. This is one of the most BREATHTAKING places I have ever been.

Crater Lake did not come about because Mount Mazama blew it's top, which is widely believed, it collapsed in on itself. As this enormous volume of magma (54-63 km3, or 13-15 mi3) was rapidly removed from the chamber (about 5 km, or 3 mi below Earth's surface) to feed the climactic eruption, it created a huge void underneath the mountain. Leaving no support for this massive dome, the roof of the magma chamber collapsed, forming the bowl-shape depression known as a caldera.

Crater Lake is 1,943 feet (592 meters) makes it the deepest lake in the United States, and the seventh deepest in the world. Its fresh water is some of the clearest found anywhere in the world.

There are numerous trails for hiking and biking. Trails vary greatly in difficulty and length, but for healthy adults and kids you can definitely find a trail to suit your adventure level.

When we went we hiked Garfield trail, which is about 3.5 miles long and about a 1000ft vertical climb. We took out time and enjoyed the multitude of sites from that elevation. The kids did great, and while we did have to watch our step in a few places it was perfectly doable with our whole family

We even stopped to have a snowball fight, with an average snowfall every year of 522 inches, spots of snow can still be seen all year round. What a treat for our kids to get to play in it in July when snow hasn't been seen around here in months.

If your going to Oregon you MUST go here. For 10 dollars you get a week long pass into the park and endless adventures for your entire family.

You can see all the activities, from a boat ride to Wizard Island to Junior Ranger Programs on the Crater Lake National Park website.

As a note, none of these were photoshopped to improve the color of the water it truly is THAT blue. It's absolutely spectacular!

At the Old Ball Game

This weekend I was invited to attend my God son's baseball tourney. They were playing in the state finals and I wanted to go and take pictures.

It all started with being invited to take pictures of the team leaving town, state bound, complete with firetruck accompaniment.







I wasn't able to make it to the Friday night game which they lost, but I did make it to the second game on Saturday. WHAT A GAME!! Final score was 9-7, won with a walk off home run, by Zack Griffin.

Final result we ended up 4th in the State! Not to shabby for such a small town. It was a great time and I love these pictures, as you can see from the mass amounts of pictures I took.

Oregon Part 3

I am so elated at the positive response my Oregon posts have been getting. I knew I couldn't possibly be the only person that wanted to take her family on a vacation that had nothing to do with Mickey Mouse.

I'm going to skip around a bit, and talk about one of our day excursions.

The first is our trip into Jacksonville, Oregon just a few miles west of Medford.

Jacksonville was founded following discovery of gold deposits in 1851–1852. With the creation of Jackson County, it became the county seat, a role which was transferred to nearby Medford in 1927.

Jacksonville was home to the first Chinatown in Oregon, founded by immigrants from San Francisco, California. Evidence of this chapter of history was uncovered early in March 2004 when road work uncovered artifacts dating to the 1850s and 1860s. Construction was halted while archeologists performed four days of rescue excavations. Their findings included broken Chinese bowls and tea cups, handmade bottles, and fragments of opium paraphernalia and Chinese coins.

When the gold deposits were worked out, and the railway bypassed Jacksonville in 1884, the city's economy slowed. This had the unintended benefit of preserving a number of structures, which led to Jacksonville being designated a National Historic District in 1966, covering over 100 buildings. It was cited as a:

mid-19th century inland commercial city significant for its magnificent group of surviving unaltered commercial and residential buildings. The city was the principal financial center of southern Oregon until it was bypassed by the railroad.

It's a lovely little town, not equipped with to much to do but shopping, however I still recommend for it for a low key historical adventure. This town resembles a living museum. There are displays of an old bank, hotel, and water well all amongst people whom live and work here every day. If you enjoy seeing interesting real estate the houses here are quaint and unique. I love to drive/walk through the different neighborhoods.

As for the shopping I mentioned, all of them extraordinarily unique in their offerings, from antiques, and an extensive toy store, to a gourmet food store.

Pictures from our trip into Jacksonville.

Here are a few downtown street shots.













Handle from a historic well that used to supply water to the townspeople.



If you decide that you'd like to stay in Jacksonville, I've heard this place is nice. Judging from the outside it looks like a WONDERFUL place to spend a few days.

The Bybee's Historical Inn

Our Little Dare Devil

Recently our youngest Caide discovered that he could climb the stairs. He'd scoot up there as fast as a bullet train. Laughing the entire way up.

We have a spiral staircase and finding a gate for it, has proven difficult. Instead we've found that our computer chair fits perfectly and keeps him at bay.

Unless of course his mother moves said chair because she is planning to put him down for a nap, and he sees a second of opportunity, to which he of course takes advantage of.

Needless to say as I see him half way up he catches a glimpse of me, catching him in the act. Being that he is nothing but ornery, he starts to giggle in defiant delight and falls.

I didn't make it in time, I manged to scoop him up within seconds but the damage was done. Our smallest one had broken both bones in his forearm.

He is so so pitiful looking and I hate to say this but dang if he isn't just the cutest thing in his cast.

Taken with a cell phone at the hospital.

Right before they casted him, as you can you'd never know he had a broken arm, look at that grin!



Right after they have him his temporary cast.



These were taken today, he got his permanent cast and after such a busy morning conked out on the couch.

Oregon Part 2

I left you all at the airport if I am correct.

Let's skip over the flying portion where I was tweeting about needing to drink just to make it through. Skipping right over... truth be told the older kids were great, it was the youngest little terror that well terrorized me. So perhaps that is a slight exaggeration, but he's at the age where he wants to move and that just isn't very conducive to being stuck on an airplane for 3.5 hours.

Let's fast forward to the landing and eating lunch at one of my most FAVORITE restaurants Kaleidoscope Pizzeria and Pub.

Specifically I'd like to recommend the Baja Picante Pizza, Chicken Enchilada Pizza, and the Rogue Ranch Salad. All to.die.for. This place is a little hippy, a little eclectic, uniquely designed and OH MY GOODNESS delicious. I haven't had anything bad here. I'd almost consider moving to Oregon just so I could eat there on a regular basis. Seriously it's that good.

I took this picture when we were there in 2008, it's of some of their artwork that they have in the outdoor dining area.



In Oregon we were staying with Mike's Grandmother and Aunt Gayb. However, Mike's uncle Bart also lives in Oregon and he stopped over for a visit one of the first days we were there.

I managed to talk all three siblings, my father-in-law, aunt and uncle-in-law in to getting a picture together. I'm not sure when the last time the three had a photo taken but I'm told it's been a while.



Bart also brought over his dog Dolce, and for never being around small children she was really great with Caide. He made sure to break her in complete with tugging and pulling. Since Bart will be a new Grandpa come November, this isn't exactly a bad thing.





Granny and Gayb also have 3 dogs of their own. I only managed to take a picture of Abby though, affectionately referred to as "the fur pig". She's a sweet sweet golden and she too did well considering the limited exposure to small kids. All of the dogs (even nippy Daphne) did well for that matter. Gunny whom we wanted to dognap and bring home with us would play ball every day with Caide, it was absolutely precious.

ABBY:


Along with numerous cats, 2 horses (Danny and Fancy), some Koi fish and a variety of other animals, there was also a few of these guys that would come out at night to sing to us.



Finally I will leave you with a picture of Mike, my knight in shining armor, with our youngest checking out Danny.




I know this part 2 of our vacation doesn't highlight specific things to do if vacationing in Oregon, but it does show that vacations can be anything. We had just as much fun sitting around talking as we did on the outings that we paid for.

Besides, it's my blog and I can write what I want. ;)

Part 3 to come....

Oregon Part 1

Over the last two weeks I was blessed to be able to take a wonderful family vacation to Oregon.

"Oregon? You mean you didn't go to Disney world?"

No we didn't.

I know it's hard to imagine anyone going on vacation with small children and not going to a overpriced, cliche theme park, but that is just what we did.

"OUCH! Did she just say that?"

Yep I did. Disney world is fine and I've been there but it's NOT the only place to vacation, and frankly it doesn't even make my top 10 for cool stuff to do with your family.

Do I seem bitter? I guess in a way I am. When I started researching our family vacation over a year ago I Googled until my fingers hurt trying to find a fun place to take my family that WASN'T Disney.

Every time I typed a new set of key words I thought my brain would explode when yet ANOTHER Disney ad popped up. Truth of the matter is there is very little information out there about family vacationing. In fact there is so little information that I'm seriously contemplating writing a book, "The Anti-Disney Vacation".

In the end, we opted for a family vacation that included a visit with family and we settled on a trip to Oregon.

I'm going to commit post suicide here, skip to the end of the story and just say WE HAD THE BEST TIME! This vacation was better than I could have ever imagined.

Let's face it with 5 kids 3 adults (oh and did I mention we took along my father in law?) this trip could have ended disastrously. Enough said, any sane person can understand my reluctance to create a fairy tale picture in my head of how this vacation would go. However, even if I had, this vacation was better than any fairy tale I could have dreamt up.

Our vacation started out with us flying out of Indianapolis (IND) and into Medford, OR (MFR). For the purpose of this being informative I am going to stop here, and talk about flying, TSA, airports, etc.

First if you have the option to fly out of Indy vs Ohare or some other airport do it! In November of 2008 Indy opened their brand new airport complete with post 9/11 design. What does that mean exactly? It means TSA wasn't just thrown into some back corner where you have to stand in make shift lines and then go through a haphazard setup.

Let's just say that Indy got it right. Not only do they have several TSA lines, but they are broken up into 3 types of lines. The casual traveler, the experienced traveler, and (drum roll) the FAMILY LINE! The family line ROCKS my SOCKS off. First you go to a table where a TSA agent comes and helps you put your things in bins, there are benches for the kids to sit down and take their shoes off. The TSA agent handles almost everything as far as your baggage goes and your left free to handle helping out the kids. It is as pain free as going through TSA can be. Thank you Indy for making me not want to commit hara kari before my vacation even started.

Before we left I packed each child with a book bag complete with their favorite quiet activities, books, crayons, coloring books, etc. I also packed food, because if all else fails food will keep them content and quiet. It was simple food, trail mix and animal crackers but it worked like a charm. I also packed each child their own pack of gum to help with the pressure change. The bags were a hit! I wouldn't do anything different. They had no idea what I packed so when we got on the plane it was like unveiling a present. They loved it!

This is where I am leaving you today.... More to come.

What?! I have to leave you in suspense. I will however leave you with one picture, unfortunately none from the airport because our point and shoot is missing and I wasn't going to drag out my DSLR.

This is one of the kids at Crater Lake. Such a beautiful place!