A Washington Excursion

We want to say “Welcome Back” to Ruth’s sister, Emily, and her family! They have been in Japan for the last couple years, and now they are moving to Colorado, which is a bit closer.

Before they were off to their new home, they spent some time in Portland with Scott’s family. But that also meant we got to see them. While we were with them we took a little walk in the Ridgefield NWR after lunch at a Mexican Restaurant that we like.

Matthew and Anna liked running ahead of us:

Then Anna paused and posed for some great photos. Isn’t she cute.

There was a cold nip in the air, but we had a great time. Here the kids are having fun looking at the gravel.

We are glad we got to see them and we're happy they are back.

Thanks for coming and visiting us!

You can see their post about their visit here.

P.S. This post is our 100th post. Yay for blogs!

We like the Gorge (and salmon)

Another beautiful day in the Columbia River Gorge. We started on Crown Point, and they view was very nice with all the fall colors.

It was also very blustery:

We did some of our usual stops at our favorite waterfalls.

Multnomah Falls looked very nice. It also had lots of salmon getting ready to spawn. It is always fun to see these giant fish within arms reach.

Our last stop was by Eagle Creek (where we hiked last year). Here the fish were even more numerous. And many of them were fighting for room to spawn

I watched this one chase off the same fish several times.

We ended the day by watching the sunset over the River and then some ice cream from the place we like in Cascade Locks.

10000 Days Old! Sure, You Think That's Old

Today, Dana turned 10000 days old. Hurray for him. We ate cheesecake and played Goldeneye and Mariocart on the Wii.

Epic.

Happy Halloween

      Happy  

Halloween!

Hello Everyone,

We have had a fun October and now it is Halloween. We would like to share some Halloween fun we have done:

Friday, the Zoo had it’s annual Squishing of the Squash. That is where they give the elephants a giant pumpkin to squish and then eat. It was a lot of fun to watch the elephants take on a large gourd:

Squishing of the Squash

In this video the baby (2 year old) elephant ended up with a fairly large chunk of the pumpkin. He was trying with all his might to break the chunk into smaller pieces without much avail. Here is when he was quite frustrated with it and ended up getting it all over his face.

Baby Pumpkin-Face Elephant

Ruth and I got pictures with some of the pumpkins that were not smashed.

 

And here is some delicious chocolates that my dad’s wife, Terry, gave us for Halloween.

Ruth is mimicking  the best one, which was surprisingly filled with something similar to pop-rocks. They were all very good.

Another “Hike-and-wildlife” Post

So, our update this time is another hike with some wildlife pictures… I sure hope you guys aren’t sick of these yet…Because the Washington/Oregon area has a ridiculous amount of hikes (and wildlife). So too bad for you guys ;-).

Dana and I went to see Wahclella Falls. We had tried before to go on this hike and were thwarted by the small parking lot. So we tried again.

First along the trail was this smaller falls called Munra Falls. It was kind of wispy and pretty.

             

The amphitheater around Wahclella is kind of giant and overwhelming. I took this picture at the bottom of the amphitheater. Can you find Dana?

Dana took this picture from his high spot. You can see a smaller rivulet coming into the stream above the falls down a rock face.

          

Ok, more gratuitous waterfall pictures…

        

On our hike back Dana found this pretty snake. She was big and she smelled pretty strongly.

 

Dana found this little salamander in the stream near the end of our hike.

It was a very pleasant hike with some very pretty views of the Gorge. Yay the Gorge!

Ok, for all of you who suffered through our pictures, we have some news: We are expecting a baby! I’m due at the end of April. We will find out at the beginning of December whether we’ll have a boy or a girl. Until then, we eagerly await our little Quazar.

A Note

A new post on my Zoo Blog has been made…and this one has a video.

Logs in a lake, toads in our hands, and a crustacean caught red-handed.

Last Monday, I had a day off work and we took the opportunity to leave town for a day. So, in our great originality, we went back up to Mt. St. Helens. This time we went to east side of the mountain to Windy Ridge. I went up there with my brother Steen just after I had come home from my mission 6 years ago, and it was a very nice time of year to come, because the weather is good and the colors are just starting to turn (and the toads are emerging).

Steen took me on a hike to Harmony Point on the shore of Spirit lake, where hundreds of trees were deposited after the lake was hit by the giant landslide in 1980 and the water rushed up the surrounding slopes, gathering the dead trees. This is a hike I have been wanting to do again and take Ruth on.

So, here is proof that we made it all the way:

I really like it down there, because it is a really nice view of the mountain, and you get to walk through a very interesting landscape.

 

Plus Ruth caught this really pretty beetle while we were down by the lake:

And here are the toads mentioned (look closely):

 

These are hundreds of baby toads who have just changed from tadpoles to adults. Around the lakes near the mountain these come out in bucket loads and they are very small. There are also still tadpoles swimming around in the water, many with various numbers of limbs.

 

These little toads have the potential to reach the size of this girl that we found on our hike:

While looking at toads, Ruth also spotted this guy in the water:

   

That was our Monday adventure. Geology and Biology on the same trip.