Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Eureka, CA

I know we've said it before when we've talked about having some pretty amazing scenery in our drives, but this one was unlike any other. We took Hwy 101 from Bandon, OR to Eureka, CA. The front half of the trip was right up next to the ocean. Really special. There was something so refreshing about taking a break from driving along the mountains and driving along the coast.


There were a couple points where we would pause and take a few pictures, or slow down just a tad to get them as we went. We kept seeing these giant rocks shooting out of the water, but it never got old. The water was so close, I told Mark that I just wanted to touch it. There were little beaches all along the way and we decided we would stop at one of them and jump in, because who knew when we'd get the chance to do it again.

So we picked one of the next beaches and pulled off on the side of the road, went down the side of the hill and stepped on the sand. The glorious sand that's been touched by the salty lips of the ocean. There were a few other people on the beach and they were panning for gold. No joke, Gold Beach was the next beach along the drive, but they were searching the beach that we were at. I asked one of the guys if he would record us jumping into the ocean. That would have been a FAIL blog if we didn't get that on video.


I think he was amused by us, and as we gallivanted towards the water he yelled that it was 46 degrees, but we didn't hear him because we were already enticed by the ocean's waves and committed to throwing our bodies into them.

Cold. It was cold.

We came out shivering. Mark says he immediately regretted going completely under. I don't believe him. The memory was too special and absolutely necessary. It was worth it. We can now say we jumped into the ocean. I won't ever forget that moment.

We climbed up the hill back to our car and changed into some dry clothes for the rest of our drive.


Our fascination with bridges continued.


I can't get enough of these pictures, they're so perfect. But about halfway through the ride we took a little break from the ocean because the road started going a little inland. There are some giant red trees that I guess they wanted people to drive in the middle of.

I wish I had a picture of one of the Redwoods, but every picture I have is mostly blurry. We were going too fast to catch any of them in stillness. They aren't all so big that you can't wrap your arms around them, but there definitely were some.

When we got into town we found a hotel to stay at for the night and brought our stuff there and then headed downtown to Old Town Coffee & Chocolates.


We set up in the corner of the room, got a couple chai teas and played a couple hours for the kind folks of Eureka. We met a rather nice gentleman who tipped us very well as he left, I grabbed a CD and brought it outside to him and he told me "Bless your heart." It's those small things that stick with you.


The hotel we were staying at didn't have any double parking spots, so we unhooked the trailer and just chained it to the brick post. It was literally right next to our room so that made Mark more comfortable with that.

Our show was in the afternoon and it was our first night that we had free in four days, so we decided that we needed to enjoy it. I was feeling pretty tired and I was backed up on the vlogs and it seemed like there was so much to do and I didn't know how I'd get it all done. But we decided to just put that on hold and enjoy dinner. Mark wanted sushi and I was wanting some Italian and we hadn't seen a sunset yet, and lo and behold Eureka has a Japanese/Italian restaurant that is right on the ocean. Who would've thought? So we went to Bayfront. Mark's sushi was good, my pasta was mediocre at best, our waitress was terrible. But we went outside on the pier after dinner, because the table next to us said there were seals out there.


It was a great view. We didn't really catch the sunset, but it was just starting to get dark and the lighting is always really pretty. But it was really chilly so we didn't stick around long. We went to the grocery store to fill up our cooler with lunch supplies for the next few days and we picked up a couple drinks and went back to the hotel room to work.

While I was editing the Portland vlog, Mark edited the vlog from Bandon. I'm a bit of a control freak so it was hard to give up some of my responsibilities and ask for help, but it was necessary so that we didn't fall even more behind.

We started doing voiceovers to the vlogs, sort of like a director's commentary and we were pretty giggly so it made it even better. After the vlogs finished we got some sleep and it was time to go to our next destination.


Hwy 101 was taking us all the way to San Francisco.



Until next time,
Jordan

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