NW Pre & Post Wedding 2015

We got back a few weeks ago from our wedding roadtrip. We got married on the beach outside of Forks, WA as many of you know. Those pictures still aren't here yet, but I wanted to share a bunch of others from the trip. We drove 3700 miles, saw a lot of country, found that Idaho can be a scorching desert, and much of the west coast is in a severe drought. That said, it was still a beautiful trip and we had a blast!

 Jake and M make the dinners, I do the dishes!

Camp number 1 outside of Vernal near Flaming Gorge. Figured we had to test out the new "testicle toss" set.  

The trip wouldn't have been the same without this guy.  

The next leg of our trip we wanted to check out the Sawtooth mountains outside of Stanley, Idaho. We hiked to a really pristine cold alpine lake - Goat Lake. Reese and all the other dogs there loved it!

 Yep, the Sawtooths are pretty cool. 

Someone taking a photo of me, Miranda and Jake. Random dogs for scale. 

 The lifeguard takes a dip

And then takes a nap before she finishes her apple 

He loves swimmin', but I think this lake was a bit on the cold end for him 

Hangin out back at camp. We stayed here 2 nights.  

Since my parents were headed to Forks, WA also for our wedding, we met up with them on the road near White Pass, WA on highway 20 for a night. 

 Another pertinent stop for our trip involved a "Home Depot" size/type of liquor store in Olympia. Hey, I had to make sure all of our guests would have plenty to drink. I went maybe a little overboard, but it was pretty fun buying that much alcohol at once. I thought the shopping cart might break. 

Woohoo, there's gonna be a party 

Our first beach....somewhere along the 101 in WA.  

Going for a morning run along Rialto Beach, Jake takes it all in 

Near "hole in the wall" on Rialto

Two good buds, Kevin and Jake

Here's a couple photos of the Manitou Lodge we stayed at for our wedding - an awesome place! 

This is the outside communal shower for the tentsites. The umbrellas really do help when it rains!

The Manitou Lodge itself 

Someone along the way told us that his favorite beach in the entire Pacific Northwest was Ruby Beach, and that we ought to check it out. So we did. The night after our wedding, everyone pretty much left, and exhausted yet happy, Miranda and I and the puppy headed out to this beach to enjoy the evening sunset.   

 Reese was really thirsty, but he never learned that salt water isn't drinkable. Instead, he drank it then threw up. 

 Interesting small jellyfish

 We decided to continue our celebration by making some mimosas. 

 Whoooooooooaaahhhh

The wedding weekend proved to be a lot of emotional and physical stress for Reese - all the little kids chasing him around, semi-neglect from us, and all the unknowns had him feeling pretty in the dumps before we got out as a little family on this beach. He's 100% recovered now! 

The next day, we met up with our remaining friends to camp a few more days. We had this bright idea of taking some forest service roads outside of the national park in a hope to find dispersed camping. We found NONE. Instead, we got a flat tire, and then ran into several literal roadblock obstacles that made what would have been 26 miles on the highway become 8 hours on dirt backroads. 

 Dispersed camping isn't something I found any of in WA. I'm sure it exists, but it is one thing I really love about Colorado. 

We finally just settled with a campground - it was gorgeous though. This one was called Klahowya

PHOTOBOMB

We figured we were already in NW Washington, why not go check out the northwesternmost point in the lower 48 - so we went to see Cape Flattery

 Foot for scale....nice 100' cliff straight into the ocean

 Cape Flattery

 The last beach we visited was called Hobuck - it was on an indian reservation. Really nice and sandy though.

 Hobuck Beach, WA

He wasn't planning on a full facial dive, so came out a little surprised.

 Shade is precious

Heading back home, never been on a ferry so we took a short one from Kingston to the Seattle side.

Next, we headed towards Leavenworth, a cool touristy Bavarian-themed mountain town. It was 102, so a swim was in order. 

In Leavenworth, we just had to eat at a nice German restaraunt, and here I'm sipping on a german chocolate cake desert porter beer. 

Miranda pretending and wishing she could drink this beer. 

And of course, no trip would be complete without a random domesticated goat hanging out on a highway bridge at 11pm!

Oh yeah - also, Idaho was HOT. Driving on I-84, most of the way it was 103-108 and the car was teetering on overheating. Glad to be back in Gunnison.