Author: Jon Arnold

Dear Coleman Corp,

My new $45 chimney grill worked great until it melted. We got to use it maybe 6 times.  Seriously, the heat from the charcoal melted the supports in the middle that hold up the grates.

This was the beach at mid-day today. Now I know where all that happy grunge music came from! 🙂

It’s overcast and chilly, but the Arnolds have reached the Pacific!

We made it to Oregon today. This is the view of our camping spot (more on this in a second):

Last weekend before leaving Idaho, we stopped at the Nez Perce National Historic Park and learned about yet another native American tribe screwed over by the burgeoning U.S. government. (Seriously, the history of how the west was won is sad.) Anyway, it has struck both Amy and me how relaxed and happy these state and national park people seem to be. Seeing this park ranger on her lunch break, it’s no wonder why:

Later that day, we made our way to the campground where we stayed all week; Hood Park in Burbank, WA. Great place, and the price was right: only $22/night on the weekend and $11/night during the week!

The sunsets were intense. Long shadows against golf-course-like lawns. (Sprinklers were going constantly during the day. I think it’s a fire-prevention thing, but it seemed pretty neurotic.)

No crazy side trips this week…just a nice non-eventful week.

Although, Amy felt my appearance was devolving from “avant-garde woodsman” to “degenerate castaway” so it was time for a shave and haircut for the first time in over a month. Speaking of firsts, I went to an actual professional for the first time in 20 years:

I didn’t like it. Not only did he not have the tender touch of Amy, he left a few stray hairs unshorn. For $10, I expected head-shaving perfection.

We left Burbank today and crossed into Oregon, following the Columbia river pretty much the whole day. We stopped at Ainsworth State Park in Corbett, Oregon but all of the spots were full.

This very helpful park ranger let us park in his parking spot for a couple hours to see if anything opened up.

While we waited, we visited a few cool waterfalls nearby.

No campsites opened up, but they let us stay in the parking spot, which we were very grateful for.

Tomorrow we plan on making it to the coast…I’m pretty excited about that. Also, we will be going through a town called “Idiotville.” Could the name of this town have anything to do with gas stations in Oregon not allowing customers to pump their own gas?

First campfire of the trip. I’m not sure why Natalie is digging a hole.

Filling up the RV water tank to this beautiful Washington sunset.

People at these RV parks are so friendly. For example, this random grandfatherly man just gave me these fresh picked cherries.

Amy and the girls picked fresh blueberries this morning, so it’s blueberry pancakes and bacon for dinner. Mmmm…

I’ve been meaning to mention this for weeks now: we see these little drive-thru coffee booths all over the northwest:

Last weekend we made our way to Missoula MT where Amy ran the Missoula Marathon. This was the scene the day before when all the runners sign in, get their race packets, etc.:

It was at a nice city park with lots of stuff for kids:

As usual, Amy did great:

Resting afterward:

This big hill (with the big M on it) was very close to where Amy’s race was:

While she soaked her feet in the nearby Missoula river, I hiked up to that “M” and then to the top. It was way harder than I thought it would be.

A couple days later, Amy hiked it too (note that she’s above the clouds):

Having been on the road for a month, the vehicles were looking pretty grubby. Nothing $10 worth of quarters can’t fix:

Next we landed in Lolo, MT, at square-dancing RV park!

The internet was horrible here, but it was an otherwise lovely place. Nice trees.

It rained a bit, but Natalie didn’t mind:

Bill and Carolyn were our awesome neighbors. They had us over for drinks one night.

We HAD to check out the square dancing action, though this night was merely a practice:

For me, it was hard not to think of square dancing as a little goofy, but it honestly looked pretty challenging. And these people were clearly having a great time, and that made me happy.

After Lolo, we went to Lolo Hot Springs and stopped at an RV park that was hosting a little bluegrass music festival.

Our camp site was right next to a river, which made the girls happy:

The music festival was called “greengrass” since it was bluegrass music but with an earth-friendly, “green” theme. Think Hee-Haw meets Woodstock. That night was the Shook twins. They were excellent.

The next morning, Carrie and Nat slept in while Amy, Em, and I went for a climb at the edge of the campground.

The air smelled like pine. And I wished there was a zip-line!

Last night we made our way to Hell’s Canyon Stat Park in Idaho, but all the camping spots were taken. They took us to an “equestrian parking” lot covered in horse manure at the top of a hill where we could basically just park for the night. It was either stay there or find a Wal-mart parking lot.

We stayed, and had a nice quiet evening.

We had the whole place to ourselves.

Today we are heading to Burbank, Washington. We don’t have reservations (as is our policy now), so hopefully they’ll have a spot for us.

My office this morning.