Weekend: Seattle

Updated January 2025. Seattle is just a hop, skip, and jump away from our home in Portland, which makes it an ideal weekend getaway. Nicknamed the Emerald City for its year-round greenery, it generally shares Portland’s mild climate. This can make it an attractive spot for to escape oppressive summer heat for folks in hot […]

Weekend: Oregon Coast

Updated 2/2025. I originally wrote this post in September 2020 after a weekend in Coos Bay, followed by a drive north along the Oregon Coast before returning to Portland. Since then, I’ve made updates to include more detail from weekends in and around Astoria and Netarts Bay. Short story, Oregon’s Pacific coast is beautiful, and […]

10 Days: Olympic Peninsula Camping

Despite living in the Northwest for over a decade, I didn’t take my first trip into and around the Olympic Peninsula until 2020: the coast, the towering evergreens, the unspoiled lakes, and—at least for the first half—clear skies. The National Park/lack-of-airport thing got in the way before, but after pivoting to different forms of travel […]

Hard Pivot: Air Travel to Road Trips

Back in January and February 2020, I had big plans for this site: posts from Boston in April for my birthday. Norway in May to celebrate Sytten de Mai. Alaska in July … wheels up, let’s do this! Wow, how things can change. To quote Lily Tomlin as Violet Newstead in 9 to 5: “I’m […]

Quick Take: Sonoma Wine Country

Sonoma’s wine country is more than just great wine—its rolling hills, twisting old vines, and the earthy scent of harvest in the air. Whether you’re a wine lover or just chasing the views, it’s a destination I love to explore in every season.

Maui: Part 1 – Van Camping and Touring

As much as I love the Northwest (aka: Upper Left), winter can be a gloomy drag. A solution: take two work holidays, add two weekend days, and mix in round trip flights to Maui and a camper van. Presto! Sounds simple, right? Well, kind of. Sure, Thanksgiving and the day after are work holidays for […]

Quick Take: JFK’s TWA Hotel

We started a quick Big Apple weekend with drinks at the restored Saarinen-designed TWA terminal-turned lounge and hotel at New York’s JFK airport. If you have a flight through JFK Airport, it’s definitely worth making your way through the red carpeted tunnel. Drinks aren’t cheap, but are less pricey than you’d expect. And the servers […]