Neskowin - Christmas 2014

This year's Christmas was the first in quite a few years that we did not celebrate in Wilsonville with family, but instead headed out to the gorgeous Oregon coast. We rented a little condo straight at the coast with a nice view of Proposal Rock.

And then we got out to do what we had come for: looong walks along the endless, deserted beach - rain or shine:

Which made for a happy dog...

George and Abby took a while longer to settle in, but they came around, eventually.

Christmas Eve was particularly stormy and so large amounts of sea foam piled up on the beach. (Contrary to common perception, this is - at least on the Oregon coast - not due to pollution, but due to a productive ocean ecosystem.)

PDX International Raceway

Billie and Rod invited us to drive along the raceway near Portland, which is always nicely decorated during Christmas time. And it was a lot of fun! Christmas music on the radio, lots of lights outside. It really put me in the right mood for Christmas. Pepper and Maggie joined us, of course, and Pepper also seemed genuinely interested in all the lights outside! And afterward we had dinner at Xico, a Mexican restaurant. A great evening with great friends!

Dog Days

This year it struck me: Pretty much any time Pepper and I walk across campus, students ask if they can pet him, and then they tell me how much they needed that because they have an exam in a few, or they have a lot of homework to do, or.. fill in the blanks. And what's the most stressful time? Finals week of course.

So I sent an email to my fellow dog owners and asked them if they'd be willing to volunteer some of their time during finals week, to make their dogs available half an hour before a final. And guess what - we got nine wonderful dog/human teams together to cover 12 pre-final time slots. All in all, about 100-120 different students came, several of them multiple times. I call that a great success :).

Pepper had a great time too. Note the blurry tail :)

Cookies!

It's this time of year again... I can't believe it! Aaaanyways...

Here are a few pics of our latest cookie creations:

Mint cookies with chocolate coating (they were a bit too big, and really, they needed more chocolate anyways :)):

Lemon sugar cookies with sprinkles:

Mint chocolate cookies, second try (half as big and with more chocolate :)) and almond Vanillekipferl:

Thanksgiving dinner

Just like the last few years, we were fortunate enough to be invited by Billie and Rod to a great Thanksgiving dinner. This time in their home on Ladd Hill rather than on the coast, though (makes for a much shorter drive!).
The 23-pounder was expertly carved by Rod under the watchful eyes of Maggie, while Billie cooked and entertained simultaneously.

The meal was great, as is tradition, and we enjoyed the company of Terry, Donna, Tim, Pat, Hong (sp?) and Huong (sp??), as well as their teenage daughters (who did NOT want to be there...).

And then the Seahawks beat the 49ers 19:3 - what more can you ask for?

Spark of Resistance - 60 minutes to escape

Today we went to Spark of resistance - 60 minutes to escape, a super-fun event in Portland. Here's the story: You are special agents, and one of your fellow special agents went missing. Your job is to get into his office and search for clues about what happened. And you have 60 minutes to achieve it. Lots of fun (even though we didn't quite make it in time (at least we freed our fellow agent)).

Here's us afterward having dinner. 

Halloween

Pepper went as Dr. Who this year (and I as the Tardis!). 

Sailor and Maggie

Billie and Rod are on a 3-week vacation in Australia, so we are taking care of their furry family members, Sailor and Maggie. Pepper is having a great time with his girlfriend, and Abby and George have accepted Sailor as well (although they are far from being buddies). Just a few impressions of our currently 5-pet home.

Here's Mag having a nap after an exhausting first day. And Mag, Pepper, and Jan walking in Lake Oswego. Beautiful little town!

It's quite difficult to get a photo of Sai that is not fuzzy. She's always on the move!

Walk with Pepper and Mag, and the whole furry family (Abby and George are outside looking in). 

Here's Maggie at work in Pepper's kennel She decorated it herself by dragging all kinds of toys in it :)

Pepper and Sailor snuggling. And us at Mount Tabor in Portland.

Maggie pooped after a good game of chase with Pepper.

Last day: Sailor relaxing (she's so pretty!) and Maggie drying under a blanket after a bath.

Labor Day Weekend

I (Jan) got an early start on Labor Day weekend by taking Friday afternoon off and driving to ESI with my windsurfing gear already packed. Wind has been pretty poor on weekends this season and as the forecast was good for Friday afternoon I jumped at the chance.

When I arrived at one of my favorite spots in the Gorge (the hatchery), there was still some wind:

The hatchery

But after I had rigged up my gear and was willing to jump in it had mostly died down. I went in anyway (speaking to my windsurfing starvation this season) and mostly just drifted around for half an hour. As I made my way back in I overheard that conditions were much better at Doug's beach (30-40 mph!). So I tossed everything in the car and drove 15 miles in my wet suit due east. By the time I had everything back up and running the wind had died down there somewhat, too, but at ~15-20 mph there was still plenty fun to be had: 

Doug's beach

It rained on Saturday, so not much happened there - other than a nice rib-eye steak in the evening.

On Sunday we made our way to Molalla River state park with Dr. Pepper, who thoroughly enjoyed himself, of course (so did we).

Molalla River State Park

Monday morning saw us driving up the southern side of Mt. Hood. Tucked to the side after a very pleasant 1-1.5 mile hike through the forest is mirror lake:

 

Needless to say: good times for all involved!

New fridge!

Hawaii 2014

True to our tradition it was Hawaii time! This year we decided to go to Molokai, one of the smaller islands. We had done our homework and had come up with several great things to do:

08/03: Arrival and checking out the neighborhood. 

Here we are in the (tiny!) plane from Honolulu to Molokai. It had just enough space for 10 passengers. 

And here's the view from the plane: Honolulu and Molokai, respectively:

Our condo is super-comfy. Others have repeatedly called it "home away from home", and it does feel like it. There's a lot of this-and-that in the condo, just random things you'd find in your home but not necessarily in a vacation home. There was even chicken, fish, and beef in the freezer!

Living room and part of the kitchen:

 Kitchen:

 Bath room:

And here's the view from our balcony:

Could be worse, eh ;)?

There wasn't much of a beach outside the condo, so we took the car and explored the east of Molokai, including several fish ponds and beaches. The nearest nice beach (although with pretty coarse sand) is One Alii Park where we stopped and went for a walk on the beach (until several coconut trees and the strong wind made us turn around - don't want to get hit on the head on the first day of vacation!):

We then continued driving toward the east all the way to Puu O Hoku Ranch (that's the place where we almost rented a cabin). Here are just a few impressions of the island:

Before heading back to the condo we stopped in Kaunakakai, the biggest town on the island, to stock up on everything we'd need for the week. The biggest grocery store was closed (Sunday), so we just ended up buying some frozen veggies, fresh bananas and mangoes, and some milk. First dinner (fish, rice, veggies) on the balcony:

08/04 (Monday): Today we drove toward the west side of the island. Unfortunately, several of the nice spots are inaccessible with a regular rental car (you'd need a 4WD), so driving all the way around the island is not possible. But, we ended up at a very nice beach with super-fine sand (Papohaku Beach Park). 

The sand was very interesting: Regular consistency far away from the water (soft and regular sinking), regular consistency close to the water (pretty solid), but feeling like quick sand in between:

08/05 (Tuesday): Scuba diving for Jan! Just as every year Jan had booked a scuba diving trip while I had a lazy day at home (with lots of reading and napping :)). 

I can't really say a lot about it since I wasn't there - maybe Jan can fill in some more details later.

During that trip he also unfortunately learned that there are two hurricanes (Iselle and Julio) heading for the island. Iselle was forecast to hit the Big Island (probably as a tropical storm) on Thursday, with rain and wind in the forecast for Molokai starting on Thursday and all the way into Sunday (when Julio was forecast to hit). All our activities for Thursday (Halawa valley hike) and Friday (snorkeling) were cancelled. So while we could have stayed for the mule ride into the former leper colony on Wednesday, we decided with a very heavy heart to head out early and booked a return flight for Wednesday morning. Very sad...