The Trip: Day 1

Cover bridge in rural Oregon

The day started with one of those hotel experiences that you hope never happens. A knock at the door before the sun comes up. A man's voice. Too sleepy to think not to open the door. That happened to me the first morning.

Meg and I went to bed in one room and because the boys were getting in late, they were going to sleep in the other room, so we were alone. I had been up with the baby, but not really awake. I don't know why I opened a door to a voice that didn't identify himself ("Knock, Knock." "Who is it?" "You know.") When I cracked it open, it was a young, Asian looking guy. I yelled, "wrong room!" and slammed the door. As I got back into bed, shaken, I thought, "wait, that face looked familiar". Turns out it should have. It was my son, flesh of my flesh. I hadn't seen him in a couple of months and he had shaved his head for the summer and didn't have his glasses on. That, in combination with my being half asleep and not having glasses on myself, well...left me very embarrassed!

Here is a picture of him with his glasses and glorious locks.

Here he is looking like he did (except the glasses). Now do you understand?

We started the day at Powell's book store, the largest book store in America. It was paradise! floors and floors of books, from floor to ceiling. We could have spent all day there, but only had a couple of hours. The rest of the day was filled with driving and eating. We went to a D,D &D place, Voodoo donuts, and ate breakfast. We had donuts topped with bacon, crushed oreos, an "Arnold Palmer" that was sprinkled with lemonade mix, and some filled with cream and topped with chocolate.

After that we drove over to a place that had several food carts and literally ate at every one. I was like a gourmet Canton as far as food goes. We had fries with several different dips and cheese curds, pizza, fried pies, steak sandwiches, and tacos.

We had a long drive to the next town, Ashland OR. It was a beautiful little place and we ate at a Thai place that my neighbor recommended. I couldn't wait to try it. It was a cute little place that overlooked a creek. What we didn't know was that we needed reservations and it was a white tablecloth kind of place. A place that always welcomes a 7 month old who has been in the car for 6 hrs. and his tired and dirty family. And who promptly poops his pants. Good times. The food was great and we took turns walking by the creek with Reid to entertain him while we waited 45(!) mins. for the food.

This is his poopy face at the restaurant.

2 1/2 hrs. after dinner, we arrived in Redding, CA at a hotel that had only been open 3 days. Not quite finished, one room they were going to put us in still had the sockets hanging out of the walls. We were so tired, I would have taken it.

Long day, lots of fun.