It kind of sucks to come back to the daily grind of changing diapers, making bottles, and crying babies after having three wonderful, blissful days to myself.
Do you know what it is like to sit down for not one, but THREE meals and eat in peace. Chew each bite and savor the flavor rather than shoveling the food in my mouth so I can grab a crying baby. Heaven I tell you!!! The entire trip was so fun, relaxing, exhilarating, and beautiful.
Stacey and Julie in Portland
Hood River, Oregon is so SO Beautiful. The Colombia River runs through the Gorge, the HUGE trees, green green everything, flowers, moss, the mountains. Breathtaking.


Leaving the babies was WAY harder than actually being gone. Once I was gone it was like Hallelujah!! I’m free!!!! After Julie picked Stacey and me up from the airport in Portland we had a fabulous lunch at a little Thai restaurant called Thai Noon. YUM! We drove around Portland for a bit and then headed to Hood River. The drive there through the Gorge was so beautiful.


Once we got to the house I grabbed my camera and got busy on some flowers. They were everywhere….and you know I LOVE flowers.


That night we got cleaned up and went downtown for some drinks and dinner at Brian’s Pourhouse.

Now, I’m not a drinker. One drink a month…if that. Take four big, strong drinks and you’ve got drunk Lesley. And drunk Stacey. Poor Julie was the sober girl..sorry Julie! We met all kinds of crazy, funny people. At the bar we met Ben Stillers look alike from Dodgeball. I kid you not, check him out!

We also watched the coolest band play..they played Big Band music on crazy ass instruments…the girl played a washboard, the dude played something on top of a garbage can.


Excuse the blur…it was hard to hold the camera steady because I was laughing so hard.

The next morning we got up and drove across the bridge to Washington to go white water river rafting on the White Salmon River. Oh My God! It was SOOOOO FUN! I can’t wait to do it again. The water was freezing so we had to wear wetsuits, but other than that it was crazy fun. The rapids, the paddling, the beautiful scenery. It couldn’t get any better. I didn’t have a camera so I didn’t get any pictures. We went down this waterfall…..

It was so fun!! Your adrenaline gets all pumped and you’re on a constant adrenaline high. Strangely enough I wasn’t sore the next day from all of the paddling. That night we went for more yummy food at Aburzzo’s Italian Grill. Then more fun…..riding around on the best toy ever!! And now that I’m sober I can’t remember the name of it. Ha.

I rode around in circles for what felt like hours….again, the drink had taken over.

This is my girlfriends back yard. She owns a creek…how cool is that! Thank you Julie for everything!

Stay tuned for the story of my stupidity and knocking myself out!
*More photos here.


August 29th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
What a fabulous sounding trip!
“Do you know what it is like to sit down for not one,
but THREE meals and eat in peace. Chew each bite and
savor the flavor rather than shoveling the food in my
mouth so I can grab a crying baby.”
Um… no.
And your photos, gorgeous! Now we know you’re a great
photographer in general and it’s not just that you have
beautiful subjects.
August 29th, 2007 at 6:54 pm
I’m glad you had a great time. The pictures are beautiful; you need to start making your hobby pay you!! The work is defiantly worth it.
September 2nd, 2007 at 11:49 am
Awesome, awesome pics Lesley. Looks like you all had a great
time!
May 7th, 2008 at 11:54 am
[…] the second time I left the babies to get a much needed break and a little R&R. When I went to Hood River they were 10 months old. This time they are 18 months old and I must say leaving them this time was […]