Originally intending on driving, we found rather inexpensive plane tickets from the city of Sacramento (about 3.5 hours drive north of Coarsegold) to Portland which saved us about 10 hours of driving each way.
The main downside was that the flight there was at 6am, which means we checked out of our hotel at 4am to head to the airport. Sage's first flight was in a Canadian-built Q400, the 70-seat stretched version of the popular Dash-8 aircraft. He slept through most of the flight and seemed to have a good time! Here is a picture after we got to Portland.
Amy's brother Adam and their father met us at the airport and drove us to Vancouver to stay with Adam and his girlfriend Chivonne. She has 2 daughters, aged 3 1/2 and 2, named Azriel and Irie. Boy did they keep Sage busy! He's never slept so well as after being worn out by the two of them. Here they are having a good time.
For some reason, this Friday, everyone had the day off so we hit the road and drove 90 minutes to a lookout point close to Mount St. Helens, which had been closed for almost a year due to fear of volcanic activity and had just recently reopened. Here is a photo of the mountain...clouds covered the top, but you can clearly see the blast crater and the desolate valley below. It was really amazing to see how the eruption that happened 26 years ago still affects the landscape. Mount St. Helens can easily be seen from Vancouver and Portland and Amy's father told me about looking up from playing tennis and seeing what looked like an atomic bomb exploding over the mountain in 1980 while Donna was pregnant with Amy.
Here is Sage meeting his Grandpa Bryan. It was the first time he got up close and personal with a beard and he couldn't help but grab it every now and then!
On the second day there we went for a very scenic drive through the Columbia River Gorge. It is a whole string of State Parks with hiking trails and more waterfalls than I have ever seen in such close proximity. Here is a photo on one of the hikes showing Bryan, Amy with Sage on her back and Adam.
On the Oregon side of the gorge, I got a shot of the river valley from a scenic overlook.
Amy and Sage at one of the many waterfalls we saw along the trip.
And here is what I think is a beautiful and scenic shot of a top of one waterfall.
The next day we spent in the environs of Portland. We stopped for awhile at Washington Park for some playground time. Sage spent it rolling around on the green grass.
We then went on a bit of a city hike, crossing bridges over train tracks and the river to stroll along the waterfront. Here's 'the gang,' Amy and Sage, Chivonne, Azriel and Irie, Bryan and Amy's Aunt Sharon and Uncle Joey bringing up the rear.
Later on we went to visit Amy's grandmother who recently got out of the hospital. Here is Bryan, Aunt Sharon, Sage and Amy.
Sage got a kick out of his Great-Grandma Alice!
The next day was limited as we were flying back in the early afternoon, but we hung out at Clark College where Bryan works and Adam attends classes. Adam took an algebra test and then we headed to the airport.Amy says I can't put another plane picture on my blog so I guess you'll just have to imagine that we flew back in another Canadian-built plane, a Canadair CRJ-700 Regional Jet. Sage didn't like that flight too much because he had ear problems during descent and did quite a bit of howling. Anyway we drove home, rather tired but overall we had a really great weekend, saw a lot, and even went as far as to title the blog in French.
