Spur Of The Moment Drive To The Beach

The Suburban was in the shop so only part of the family could go anywhere. We had planned to go on a more local hike. But when that trail was still closed for the winter, we just decided to keep driving west. By the time we arrived it was later afternoon-early evening. We played on the beach for a little bit then got to watch a stunning sunset. The Oregon Coast is so gorgeous.

(This post should be on our family blog. But the layout of this blog lets me post larger pictures so I put them here instead.)

It was fun not to tell the kids. Since the two oldest were not there, it took more time before Nathan was paying enough attention to notice what the signs were saying. It wasn't until the ocean vista was before us that Evan and Elisabeth realized. They were really confused at first, but it made it worth the drive!

We are so blessed to live where we do. Had we decided to drive east, we would have been up on the mountain in less than two hours or in the desert in three.

I love adventures!

Don't Shine Red

Oregon is known for it's lush forests and for having lots of greenery, scenic hiking trails and other outdoorsy stuff. Oregon=Rain. Rain is practically synonymous with Oregon. There are all of the jokes about Oregonians having webbed feet and rusting rather than tanning. We understand rain and wet. We know how to handle it, to cope with it throughout most of the seasons. We don't do well with sun.

We have had a wet winter. We had unseasonably cold weather in April, even snow - which is not at all common for us. In fact, I have lived here all of my life and I don't ever remember an April snow. Now, suddenly, we find ourselves in a heat wave. We had a couple days over 90 degrees in the middle of May! Also uncommon. Wasn't it just snowing a few weeks ago?

There is something about us, apparently, that makes us not quite believe it really is sun. We probably assume there is always enough cloud cover to protect us. Or maybe we believe that, because of all of the rain, and the many days of dashing from protected buildings and diving into our cars, touting around umbrellas (or forgetting them), tolerating wet or frizzy hair, mud and puddles wherever we go and the cooooonstaaaaant drizzle, somehow it is owed to us to not have any worries associated with sun? Maybe we use sunscreen so rarely that we let it expire and it loses it's effectiveness?

Why else would there be SO MANY sunburned Oregonians already, when we have only had 4 days of sunshine? Everywhere I look, there are burned shoulders, chests and faces. Maybe we just want to be able to prove we got some sun.

Rise and shine Oregon. The sun has. Just don't shine red.

(Oh, and I may as well tell you that my husband has had skin cancer multiple times. Don't be fooled by this tricky Oregon sun. Lather sunscreen on.)