Mission: Accomplished

I'll give you a hint: It's not the Atlantic.

100 Hours, 3667 miles. Bitches.

Several years ago, I flew out to Bend, Oregon for a cousin's wedding. Since it was only a few hundred miles more to the coast, I rented a car and drove out to Heceta Head Lighthouse, which I'd found online. I brought Britt back some sand, told her how awesome it was, and promised that we'd go out there together someday. When we started planning the road trip, she found out that there was a bed and breakfast associated with it. DONE. By the way, it's the only true reservation we made ahead of time for this entire trip.

The drive from Portland to Heceta Head was rather short, although this may be skewed by having driven across entire states. I may never again complain about my daily commute. Maybe.

I could see Britt getting more and more excited as we neared the ocean. Then the trees to the left broke apart to reveal - dun dun DUN! - the Pacific Ocean! Britt started jumping up and down in her seat, cackling and screaming that we'd made it. Then she careened into the viewpoint pullover on the opposite side of the road, jumped out of the car, did a touchdown dance, and started skipping down the road.

The Bed & Breakfast was in the old lightkeeper house that neither of us were brilliant enough to take a picture of, so here's a shot from the beach below and a stock photo of the house itself.

There were little gardens with hummingbirds - swift little buggers that only appeared only when all nearby cameras were off and put away. Even a white picket fence around the whole thing. We checked in and were given a little tour. I can't really describe the inside very well either, other than it was beautiful, immaculate and a little overwhelming. But then, neither Britt nor I had ever stayed at a B&B before.

We decided to grab a bottle of wine (or two) and head down to the beach.

Jealous?

We played a hand of Kittens in a Blender, and stopped after the wind started taking the cards and kittens flew down the beach. Britt ventured into a cave and discovered it was filled with these gigantic pill bug things and ran out, while I told her that she needed to watch more horror movies. Then, we decided to play the "let's go find shells!" game, only the only shells left on the beach were attached to these giant green tuber looking things. I took out my knife and started cutting into them. Once the wiggling worm things living inside started waving at me, I threw my knife and told B it was her damn problem.

The sunset was beautiful, but we won't admit how much sleep we actually had for the entire first leg of the trip, so we went to our room with the gigantic four-poster bed with drapes, took baths in a clawfoot tub with a Lush spinning glittery shooty bangy bath bomb, and then passed the hell out.

We awoke at 8ish for breakfast, which is a 7 course meal with the rest of the guests at the house. It was a little overwhelming, and the first dish kinda sucked, but it was awesome all around. We got to speak to people from all over, some of them celebrating birthdays or anniversaries, and got some tips on where to go during the trip.

Eventually, breakfast was over, and we checked out the gift shop and bought way too much crap. But it was pretty! Don't judge us. We reluctantly left the bed and breakfast, and continued on our adventure down the coast.

Our first stop was a few miles down the road at Heceta Head Beach. It was sandy. Did you know the beach is sandy? Well, shit. Anyway, the woman who served our breakfast told us that we could find (live!) sand dollars on the beach, and beautiful oyster shells. We scooted down the dunes, and started hunting.

B managed to fall down the dunes while talking to Jim, while still on her feet. Ninja sand dune tumble!

I managed to find one intact sand dollar, while B found a starfish, tried to rescue it, and failed miserably when she put it down on the sand to roll up her pants and the sea took it.

It's the thought that counts, B.

We found aneneomenmies! anenomnemnies? whatever. Squishy green things with tentacles!

Pro tip: Don't step on them. They're squishy green things with tentacles.

B found a sand dollar that had a hole in it, but later smashed it when she piled more shells on top of it. But that's okay, I found a volcano rock that won the find-cool-shit-at-the-beach award.

It was windy and we almost got stranded on an island because we weren't paying attention, so we made our way back up the dune. As we were leaving, there was a guy in a pickup truck starting to drive up the beach. In my head, I was all, "wow, way to be a showoff," but then he stuck his head out and asked if we could do him a favor. Sure. Then he told us he wanted us to push his truck out for him. Us. Two girls. Oh, and there was a guy in a truck next to us, a guy in a truck behind him, and a guy and a girl in a pickup on the side. Did any of them help as we tried to shove the thing out of the sand? No. Oh, wait, one guy wandered over as we had basically freed it and helped give the final push. Thanks, asshole.

Rescue-five!