Northwest Tour Part 1: Cannon Beach/Portland, OR

The first leg of our journey was a few days in Cannon Beach and Portland, OR. Made our first pit stop at Coffee People to start the vacation off right with a good cup of coffee.

Our friends Nels and Lauren Johnson (Nels was Jared's #2 Best Man in our wedding) met us in Cannon Beach to stay a night. We haven't seen them in over a year and a half and we had so much fun catching up with them. We walked all over Cannon Beach, had a great dinner together and then spent many hours sitting by a beach fire that Jared and Nels started on the beach where Jared and I were staying. The next morning we met them for coffee and then they headed back to Salem, where they are both law students at Willamette.

Lauren and I barely knew eachother before this trip, but you wouldn't know it because we became instant friends! She is an amazing person and I can't wait to spent more time the four of us through the years!

Best friends...

Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach. This place is so beautiful- I grew up vacationing here and Jared and I have been many times together since we've known eachother. We just don't get sick of Cannon Beach- there is something so refreshing and peaceful about it that keeps us coming back.

We stopped at Ecola State Park on our drive from Cannon Beach to Portland to catch the amazing view of the northern Oregon Coast. The weather this day was perfect and you could see a lighthouse way out to the north in the ocean.

The night we spent in Portland was spent with my best friend, Krystn and her husband Marc and little Orland. Krystn and I go WAY back to diaper days and even though their family lives away in Europe for Marc to play professional basketball, Krystn and I have remained the best of friends. We hadn't seen them in over a year too, so the time with them meant the world to me. I would say the biggest thing I learned from this trip is how important our friends are in life...they are what makes this life so fun and so meaningful!

Jared loved Orland and Orland loved Jared. Doesn't Jared look like he's ready to do this someday?

Best best friends

There wasn't a silent moment between us... :)