Portland Trip: Day 2-4

Since I’ve been watching pictures of the wedding and reception and camping and general good time-ness flash endless on my laptop, I suppose I should get around to describing it. Sorry for the delay (Beth!).

Bux has been my friend since high school; sophomore year to be exact. It was English with Ms. Rhode and I sat in the front row between the two Jasons (which I have never in my life called them by). Long legged Bux to my left, long legged Soch to my right. I’m sure we worked on a few Macbeth projects together at some point, but the whole end result was that we became pretty good friends. It amazes me sometimes how some people stay with you well after the period of time that you knew them in has passed. Beth is one of them (kindergarten) and Bux is another. Since I have a habit of moving out of state (again and again), keeping in touch with people has never been easy. But somehow I kept in touch with Bux. I guarantee it was more the result of his efforts then mine, but it worked and there you go. Have I mentioned that Bux is 6’8”? He’s my tallest friend and incredibly huggable. That has no point to the story but I had to mention it. Anyhow, it was St. Patrick’s Day two St. Pats past when Bux sent me a little picture on my phone with a picture of his girlfriend. You could tell he was pretty proud as he’s never sent me a picture of his girlfriend before. About 10 months after that came the wedding invitation. I couldn’t have been happier for him. I was also happy to hear that it was an informal affair taking place in an Oregon campground. I hate panty hose, I really do.

Cape Lookout State Park

To pick up where I left off last time, Beth and I arrived at Lookout State Park around 4 in the afternoon…wearing nice clothes and full makeup. We said hi to everyone and had a beer, hoping that we would stay pretty long enough for everyone to see us pretty before we had to change and start the camping dirt on skin process. We lasted about 45 minutes and then I started to panic that all the good tent spots would be gone. So I changed into my two sizes too big jeans and my bad $3 on sale at Old Navy t-shirt and started pitching my borrowed tent next to a tree in the 2nd site (there were 5 sites in total in the group site). This decision turned out to work well for us (Beth pitched her tent next to mine) as the 2nd site was the gathering grounds for all the late night parties-short stumble from fun to bed.

Tents perfectly placed
Beth, Bux, and Lou

Soon after the tents were up, the wood guy (which c’mon, sounds a bit dirty, doesn’t it?) came around and bundles were bought. Then the fire started up and the cooking began. I like the below picture by the way…Beth and I had tried to start the fire and we were doing…OK, then Mr. I-used-to-be-a-boy-scout comes around and completely shows us up. The guy’s name was Terry, but I thought he looked like a Kent and called him such the entire time we were there. Not that he reads this, but sorry Terry-come-Kent. You were a good sport and a great fire starter.

Kent takes over...

Finally, Bux’s bride-to-be, Krissy, showed up and we paparazzi-ed her.


The bride to be

As the day wore on, more people showed up. Some old high school friends, some people I had previously met visiting Portland, and other people I had never met but who were all really cool. We ate and drank and talked. I’m not sure what time we went to bed finally but I’m sure I wasn’t the only one with a damaged head in the morning.


Diana, Jeff, and Beth

After breakfast and a shower, we all started to get ready for the wedding. It was to take place at the picnic grounds, overlooking the ocean…a short walk from the group camp site. Bux and Krissy had decided not to hire a professional photographer. There was really no need, every one of us had a digital camera and used it. The ceremony was nice (and short!) and the barefooted bride and groom were married (that is officially the corniest line in this post people). The reception was right there as well, with BBQ chicken and pulled pork, cupcakes, two kegs of beer and wine as far as the eye could see. Man, I’m not describing this well. Enjoy the pictures; I think you’ll get the gist.


Drinking beer at the ceremony...awesome!








By 6 PM we all, including the one remaining keg, headed back to the campgrounds. There was more of same eating, drinking, talking….and headache in the morning. It was a great time. Well, not the headache bit, but the rest of it.




Dog Butt!

After two days of dirt, Beth and I were anxious to get to our Portland hotel for a nice shower and cloths laundering. We said our good-byes, stopped for a much needed Starbucks fix, and headed to Portland.

Beth and Diana talk it out...whatever "it" is.

NEXT TIME….PORTLAND….

Camping at San Mateo Campgrounds - San Clemente, CA

Not really understanding the word ‘ironic’ the way some Europeans do, I would like to say that with all the fires raging on right now, I find it ironic that this entry is about camping. And not ironically at all, the campgrounds that I’m writing about is pretty damn close to be surrounded by flames.



Two weekends ago (I missed a weekend due to illness), a few of us went camping in San Mateo campgrounds near San Clemente. It’s the campgrounds we typically go to due to its proximity to the beach. San Mateo is actually the first campground I went to in California and the campground that got me over my hatred for camping.


You might have to strain to see it in this picture, but these guys playing football totally destroyed one of their tents from a pass from the 50 yard line.

When I was younger, camping was a big deal for my dad. He loved it. I have memories of camping in South Dakota with the buffalos. I have memories of the two week long summer trip camping up and down the Mississippi River. I even have memories of camping in butt ass cold weather every fall in Door County, WI. Every year we went camping SOMEWHERE, usually multiple times in a bunch of different weather. There were long hikes in the woods, swimming in mossy lakes, and bike rides on scenic paths.


Derek and Jamie

It was awful and I hated every single minute. What I remember is complaining about the long walks and bike rides. I remember crying buckets over having to take a shower with the june bugs. I remember holding a grudge that I was only allowed one s’more after dinner. And I remember every time it rained my tent flooded because I always set it up on a slight hill. The only thing I did like was collecting sticks for the fire, putting said sticks in the fire, and carving a stick for the marshmallows. Since that was all of an hours worth of fun, I was pretty miserable most of the time. What can I say; I was an indoor type of kid.


Andrea and Oliver

These miseries kept me from camping for a long, long time. When I was college age, friends from school would go on camping trips up in the Dells area. I always refused. I really hated camping that much. When I moved out to CA in 2000 I met up with a group that liked to go camping. I was hesitant at first, but agreed from the peer pressure. And you know what? It was awesome.


Derek and his sausage....and beans!

I never put two and two together in my head that if I went camping now, as an adult, I can do whatever I want. I don’t have to go for 18 mile walks if I don’t want to. I don’t have to shower with june bugs if I don’t want to. And I can certainly have as many damn s’mores as I wanted to (and beer for that matter!). I was hooked….

…to a degree. You can’t convince me to go on a camping trip where we have to hike up to the site with limited gear. I’m a car camper. I don’t care for pit toilets either, but I’ll deal with them if I have to. Just don’t ask me to crap in the woods.


A proper crapper is the flushing kind!

Anyhow, so we went camping a couple weeks ago. It was Derek, Ian, Ian’s little girl, Andrea, Andrea’s little boy, Kevin, and myself. Even though it rained on us the first night and I might have accidentally left both my pairs of shoes and hat out in the rain, it was fun. I ate too much as usual. I was fire-girl and kept the blaze going into the wee hours of the night (which in camping terms is like 11 o’clock). We never did go on our usual hike down to the beach (I claim tiredness due to child entertaining). I had a good time.


OK, totally awesome 'town in the dirt' that Oliver, Jamie and I built.

I’m hoping that San Mateo will survive the fires so that we can go again sometime.


And this is how you properly have a fire...