Ahhhhhh... Florence, Oregon... The smell of salt water air, costal pine trees, and campfires.
About a year ago today, my parents (who are known for their crazy ideas) brought home Stan. Stan is a 5 person sleeper travel trailer. This thing is ridiculous to say the least. First off: My dad snores like a freight train so no one can sleep in it with him. Second: My mom does not like to camp. Third: This thing was larger than 2 small Portland houses.
Flash forward to 1 year later: Stan is on a road trip to Florence, Oregon with my dad, mom, Nathan, and myself.
We set up camp at Darlings Marina & RV Resort in Dunes City. The day started out with a delicious breakfast hand cooked by my man, followed by paddle boarding on the beautiful bay. Most of the time it consisted of Nate being sea sick and trying to get the perfect Instagram picture, while keeping me out of trouble.
The wind in Florence tends to kick up around 11am each day, so we made our way back to the campsite on the choppy waters of the bay for lunch and site seeing.
Later that day, my family drove us 11 miles north on HWY 101 to the Sea Lion Caves. If anyone knows me, then they know my obsession with animals. It took all of Nathan's strength to contain my excitement at this point. The caves were beautiful. I'm just going to post pictures because I am not poetic enough to do them justice. BEST PART? THEY SOLD NATHAN'S ROASTED NUTS. (you will understand this if you have been following along with our other posts)
After the sea lion caves, we headed south to Old Town Florence. We stopped in at the Homegrown Public House for chowder and beers then headed down to the little markets.
Our next destination you ask? DUNES OF COURSE!
We took to the windy sand dunes to scour the beach for agates and shells to build a wind chime. The wind was not to be under estimated. I'm 115lbs on a good day. This knocked me right over like a human sail. After about 10 minutes of constant fighting with the wind we gave up and headed back for some good ol' R and R.
Our few nights in Florence consisted of Nathan and my mom taking turns on figuring out the best way to make marshmallows (we would later discover that it was not the cedar plank mallow), beer, card games, more beer, almost catching dad on fire, and more beer.
You know its a great trip when you can't wash out the campfire smell for a week. On that note: I think I'll have another mallow please.
