The route took us west through Tillamook then north on highway 101 to beautiful Rockaway Beach, OR.

Rockaway Beach is a small, quiet town, but my family has been going there every year for at least 25 years?  We stay in the same cabin every time, because it’s cheap and right on the beach.  Sounds great, right?

well, here’s 12-year-old ElkoSteve describing Rockaway (In Whiny Kid Voice):

This place is boooooooooooring! There’s no TV, it’s cold and rainy all the time!  The beds suck and there’s no dishwasher! Mom and Dad park the van and we have to WALK everywhere!  I’m scared of that bottle opener!  There’s only one arcade in the town and the games suck!  All we can do to pass the time is read and play cards.  Waaaaaah!

35-year-old ElkoSteve is much more comfortable here, but wow, do the beds still suck.  This is the view from the large window on the backside of the house:

Not bad for $50 a night, right?  Here’s the bottle opener young ElkoSteve was afraid of:

Freaky!  We were only there for one night, but we still had a lot of fun.

The dogs ran around on the beach like lunatics, pausing only for necessary activities:

It was a positively beautiful day, which is uncommon for the Oregon coast in May.

It turns out that there was a Kite Festival going on, with lots of kites (naturally) and food and craft vendors.  Rockaway Beach was hoppin’!

We left Rockaway on Sunday.  On the way back, we stopped in Tillamook for, what else, CHEESE!

I love Tillamook Cheese.  I’ve tried many other kinds, but Tillamook’s Medium Cheddar is, by far, the best.  We bought way too much of it, and I bought a little squishy loaf too.  First, unsquished:

Now SQUISH IT!

I can feel my stress level decreasing already.

We made it back home in time for my brother’s engagement party.  DaveKnows and Mile73 are so cute together!  While we were there, Ollie was accused of licking half the frosting off the cake.  Come on, does this look like the face of a cake-licker?

He’s so cute!  I think Ed licked the cake.  Yeah, it was Ed.

The kids went back to Elko with grandma on Monday, so the wife and I could pretty much do whatever we wanted.  Which meant girlie drinks, soccer, and pinball, of course!!!

That girlie drink is from dinner with Dave and Heather at The 5th Quadrant, the soccer game is, of course, the Portland Timbers against Montreal, and the pinball is none other than the Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade!  Possibly the best place to play pinball on the west coast!  I rocked that Demolition Man machine.

This post is getting very long, but there’s still a few things to talk about.  Almost there!

We absolutely had to visit Voodoo Doughnut after hearing about it on various Food Network shows over the last couple years.

Behold, the Bacon Maple Bar:

It was everything I hoped it would be.  Very very yummy.  If you look closely, you can also see the donut with Cap’n Crunch all over it (Captain My Captain) and the purple one is called the “Grape Ape”

For our final night in Portland, we met David and Heather as well as the wife’s friends Gary and Sara for dinner at some food carts in SE Portland.  The first one is called Potato Champion and we had some of the best poutine we’ve ever had!  The fries were outstanding and the gravy had an interesting tang to it, with lots of onions.  It was served steaming hot as you can tell:

Dave, put your iPhone down, there’s poutine to eat!!

For dessert we walked about 20 yards over to the Whiffies cart.

They are fried pies, similar to the Cornish Pasties sold at BJ Bull in Elko.  Whiffies are deep fried, though, which gives them a nice crispy, bubbly crust.  We tried the Barbecue Pork (fantastic!) the Strawberry-Rhubarb (phenomenal!) and the Chocolate-Peanut Butter (Freakin sweet!).  A fine ending to a long, happy trip.  We got to see lots of our friends and family that we’ve missed for years.  If we didn’t catch you this time, we’ll see you in August for the DaveKnows/Mile73 wedding!

Oh yeah, one last picture.  It snowed off and on while driving back to Elko, here’s a shot from the cascades.  See everyone next time!

I get yelled at if I don’t include a map of our trip so here it is!  We took 84 in from the east through Boise on the way there, then south through Bend and Winnemucca on the way back.

We took the boys out of school early on the 12th and left Elko around noon.  Because we brought the dogs this time and we weren’t too sure how they would do, we split up the drive into 2 days.  We drove up through Jackpot on 93 but instead of heading toward Twin Falls like we usually do, we drove west toward beautiful Buhl, ID.  A friend from work grew up there and told us it’s a great little town and a scenic drive so we decided to give it a shot.  The route took us into Buhl, which was cute, but the best part was the drive alongside the Snake River through some stunning scenery.  Of course we didn’t take any pictures, but trust me, there were waterfalls, cliffs, significant greenery, and animals aplenty.  We met up with I-84 around the town of Bliss and continued on our way.  We stopped for the night at the Holiday Inn in Ontario, Oregon.  The wife was feeling all congested from a cold she caught before we left and we remembered that Oregon requires a prescription to buy Pseudoephedrine (sudafed).  We could have headed back across the border but we ended up buying another product that didn’t work as well.  Curse you, Oregon and your meth-related laws! *shakes fist*

Alright, so we got up semi-early on the 13th and headed toward Portland.  We again passed the replica Stonehenge and didn’t stop to look at it.  One of these days kids, I promise.  The dogs got a quick stop in The Dalles to stretch their legs:

We arrived in Portland around 3:00pm.  Our first visit was with the wife’s grandmother, who is still hanging on at 93 years old.  We don’t know how much longer we’ll have her so it was great to see her again.

The first few days in Portland we stayed with some friends of ours, Jim and Joy and their family.  It was great seeing them after all these years!  Nothing too exciting happened, but my son did find a sweet frog in their backyard and we took some cool pictures with my wife’s new camera.  Check out the detail on that froggie!

Oooh, also while we were there, Jim fell on his bicycle and tore himself up good.  We only got pictures of his fingers but there were more body parts skinned up.  Shoulder, elbow, knee, etc. Hope you’re feeling better man!

mmmm…meaty!

So the main reason we were in Portland was for the wife’s cousin’s wedding.  I was tricked into going when I heard it was going to be held at the “Hostess” house in Vancouver, WA.  But I’d been bamboozled!  There was nary a Twinkie or Ding Dong to be found.  But there was cake.  No lie!  I especially enjoyed the topper:

The lucky couple’s vehicle was tastefully decorated as well.  Here are some highlights.  Click to enlarge!  er…maybe I shouldn’t have said that.

After the wedding we drove back out to Hillsboro where we had boarded the dogs at the PetSmart Doggie DayCare.  We found out that little Ollie had to be put in solitary because he was being mean to the other doggies and people.  He’s such a little stinker!  We bailed him out and headed toward the Pacific Ocean!

That’s all for now.  Part 2 will come soon, and include Rockaway Beach, kites, cheese, hot wings, donuts with bacon on them, poutine, fruity drinks, soccer, dogs on couches, pinball, and pie!  Stay tuned…

Below is the route we took from Elko to Vegas.  Note the right turn at Ely, which takes you to the “Lund Cutoff” on highway 318.  That cuts off about an hour from the alternate route on 93 through Pioche and Caliente.

It’s a pretty boring drive, most of it looks exactly like this:

But about an hour outside of Ely Andy had to pee (of course) so we stopped on the side of the road by this white horse:

So on to Part 2!   We woke up Saturday morning bright and early.  It was already hot.  We hit up the free buffet at the hotel for breakfast.  Cold runny eggs FTW!  Then the boys went swimming for about 2 hours.  I didn’t feel like swimming, so I sat under an umbrella, reading the newspaper and trying not to stare at the old people sunbathing.  I dragged the boys out of the pool around 11 so we could go do something else besides wasting the day away in the sun.
The hotel had a shuttle down to the strip, so we took it down to Bally’s.  We just walked through, looking at all the shops.  It connected to the Paris hotel/casino, where I purchased a strawberry daquiri in a giant vessel shaped like the Eiffel Tower.  I walked around sucking on this thing for about an hour before I realized how phallic it looked:

Lunch was at Fatburger! I ordered the large burger, which was a half-pound. A little dry, but not bad.  They make a XXL burger which has THREE half-pound burgers on it.  I saw a couple skinny guys buy them and try to eat them.  It wasn’t pretty.  I’m going to be honest with you, the main reason I went to Fatburger is because I’ve heard Notorious B.I.G. and the Beastie Boys mention Fatburger in their songs.  I’m not
ashamed.  After lunch we walked down to the MGM Grand to see the lions:

It was feeding time!  If you look closely at the bottom of the picture, you can see the reflections of a row of slot machines.  Classy!
The monorail brought us back to the hotel, where we all crashed for a couple hours.  We had a few hours to kill before the game, so we went back to the Pinball Hall of Fame.  I can’t get enough!  I tried a few of the older ones this time, the coolest of which was a Gottlieb “Challenger“, a head-to-head machine with a tilting playfield:

After pinball we stopped at Macdonalds for a quick dinner then headed to the Thomas and Mack Center at UNLV for the USA Basketball Showcase.  Our $35 seats were actually pretty darn good, about 20 rows from the court.  Best seats I’ve ever had for a basketball game.  The boys weren’t too excited but I had a good time.  Rudy Gay tore it up for 27, hitting shots from all over the court.  My boy Greg Oden played decently(7points, 10 boards, one block), but got burned a few times by Brook Lopez.  BROOK FREAKIN’ LOPEZ!  But I’m not worried, the Trailblazers will have a great season, mark my words.  Greg Oden is the blurry guy in the middle of this pic:

Yes, that was the best pic I had.  Greg is a very large man.

After the game we went back to the hotel to sleep.  I knew we had another long drive the next day so I didn’t want to stay up too late.  We got up around 8:00 in the morning, checked out of the hotel and hit up Fry’s when they opened at 9. Bought season 7 of MacGyver and loaded up on beef jerky and hit the road.  We made it back to Elko in just a tad over 6 hours.  430 miles so that is an average of around 80 mph.  Sometimes I like Nevada.

The trip was originally planned for just me to go to the USA Basketball tryouts to see a few Portland Trailblazers play.  It was supposed to be a quick down-and-back trip, Saturday and Sunday.  Over the last few weeks, plans have changed.  The boys are coming (not a bad thing, they need to get out more and it will be a good father-son-son experience) and we extended it to Friday-Sunday.

Then Lamarcus Aldridge and Brandon roy canceled due to contract issues.  OK, at least Jerryd Bayless and Greg Oden are still going.

I found out today that Bayless is dropping out too.  So now it’s just Oden.  dammit!  The boys and I will look a little silly dressed up in all our Blazer garb, rooting for one person, but we’ll still have a good time, I’m sure of it.

 I’ll be blogging the entire trip when I can.  Updates to come!

• Apple juice
• Maple Syrup
• Gravy
• America

Not necessarily in that order. 

I had Poutine for the first time, though probably not at the best place for it, Red Robin.  It really was everything I had expected it to be.  French Fries, Cheese curds, gravy.  I don’t think it was the best thing I’ve ever eaten, but it wasn’t bad.  Would I eat it every day?  No.  Once every couple months?  maybe.  The next time I visit Canada?  Of course! 

I missed out on the Chinese New Year by a week.  They were getting really excited up there, would have been a lot of fun.  Instead I celebrated by eating some Sweet and Sour chicken for lunch on Monday.

The sun — As much as I hate the extreme heat and cold, waking up to a bright sunny day 80% of the time is nice.

 
Great customer service — some businesses are great and still give off that friendly small-town vibe

Casinos –  (Sports betting specifically.  GO BLAZERS!)

Brothels — Dancing and Diddling FTW! No, I’ve never actually been to one.  I’m terrified.

The Elko Snow Bowl  — Skiing and snowboarding only 5 miles from town (when there’s enough snow)

The Ruby Mountains and Lamoille canyon.  Really beautiful.

Wireless Beehive  — if you have visibility to the towers above the “E” you can get broadband internet for $30/month and stick it to Frontier.

Centrally located — In less than 4 hours we can be in Boise, Salt Lake City, or Reno.  I guess it’s kinda sad when one of the things I love about Elko is that it’s only 4 hours away from a real city. 

Garbage pickup twice a week — and multiple cans, too! 

I-80 is a really nice highway — 80 miles per hour, a big median, and well-maintained.  Beats the heck out of the cobblestone roads in Idaho.  Just watch out for deer.