We spent about a week at Cinder Hill Campground, in Newberry National Volcanic Monument, along the shores of East Lake, which was formed when the Newberry Volcano’s caldera collapsed. We got an amazing campsite on top of the hill above the lake, with a nice flat area right on the lake where we left the canoe. There were lots of awesome volcanic rocks around the campsite, such as obsidian, a sharp, glassy black rock, and pumice, a white or grey bubbly rock that was so light it floated. There was also something else strange around our campsite: crazy chipmunks! Both Ma and Pa had chipmunks climb on them and one even nibbled Pa’s toe!

We spent most of our time canoeing around the lake, checking out beaches, cliffs and other cool things. One day, we paddled to the hot springs on the other side of the lake. The first springs were barely warm, and we were pretty disappointed, but we paddled a little farther and we found a spring that was pretty hot. We also spent one afternoon hanging out on a beautiful sand beach.

One day, Pa, Little kid, and I went to a lava tube, which is a long cave formed when lava flows through a channel and the top hardens. It was super cool! My favorite part was where a sign said that the highway crossed over the lava tube there!

We also went to the Big Obsidian Flow, which was basically a big mound of obsidian and pumice. After that, we drove to Paulina Falls, an amazing twin water fall. We had a picnic lunch there before heading back up to the car.

The next day, we moved to another campground not too far away, called La Pine State Park. From there, we took the Jetta to a trail that went to Paulina Plunge, a natural rock water slide. Little kid and I had a ton of fun sliding down the slick rocks, even though we did get a little cold. Pa also went! But then it started to sprinkle a bit, so we packed up and started heading back. The sprinkle quickly turned into pounding rain, and for a few minutes, it actually hailed! When we got back to the car, we were soaked.

We spent nine days in Nehalem Bay State Park, which is located on a spit of land between the ocean and the bay. Every morning, we went down to the beautiful beach to play. Jay played with sand, I did some boogie boarding, mom read, and dad dug giant holes. Dogs were allowed off leash on the beach, so we brought Barney with us and let him romp around the dunes. The first few days, we went all the way down to the beach and tried to build shelters to protect us from the biting wind, but then we discovered that it was much easier to just hunker in the dunes. One day, we walked the two miles on the beach to the town of Manzanita, where we walked around for awhile and got ice cream.

The afternoons were far too windy to play on the beach, so we spent them hanging around camp, playing at the playground, and hanging out at the bay. At the bay, we found a super steep sand slope that was a ton of fun to roll down. At the bottom of the slope, someone had built a couple of log shelters that Jay and I played in and improved.

When we first got to Crater Lake, we were very surprised to see mounds of snow and ice instead of grass surrounding our campsite. After all, it is June! (At least I think it is June…) After parking the RV, we drove the Jetta up to the rim of Crater Lake. We walked along the rim of the lake for awhile, taking tons of pictures of the beautiful lake. Once we were too cold to keep walking, we got back in the car and drove along the rim drive (most of the road wasn’t even on the rim). While we were driving, we saw some wacky sledders. One person had made garbage bag pants, another was sliding on a cookie tray. We saw three people with wetsuits on for sledding, (one was actually using his surfboard!), and we thought that the wet suits were a great idea, so the next day we put ours on and headed out to sled.

The day didn’t go too well. My boots kept getting filled with snow, and Jay’s hands and feet quickly got cold. Also, we had several crashes, because we were sledding on a boogie board, and boogie boards aren’t really good at turning in the snow. Jay and I were soon frozen, so we called it a day and headed home.

The next day, we went sledding again, this time with plastic bags on our feet to keep them dry, and a much steeper hill. We went so extremely fast! At first I had some trouble staying on the board: Jay and I ended up sliding down the hill head first on our backs several times. Still, it was a ton of fun! Mom also joined in the fun and went down the slope as well.

At Crater Lake, we also did something that we don’t do often- we had a campfire with s’mores every night! Jay had his first s’more, and he loved it!

After 568 days on the road, we are living in a house again. I am sad to leave the RV, after living in it for so long, but I am happy to be back in our house. We have all changed a lot on the trip. When we left, Little Kid was in diapers. Now, he is learning to read. When we left, I couldn’t find Arizona on a map. Now, I could probably find every state. We have also changed a lot physically. Here is Little Kid and I at the beginning and end of the trip.

Here are the stats:

Time on the road: 568 days
Miles driven: 28,959
U.S. states visited: 35
Canadian provinces visited: 9
Campgrounds stayed at:  174
Ferry crossings: 15
International border crossings: 18
Most border crossings in one day: 4
Time zones:  7
Walmarts camped at: 21
Costcos visited: 31
Flat tires: two
Tired purchased: 12
Gallons of gas consumed: lots!
Mosquito bites: hundreds
Photos taken: thousands

Living in the house is a lot different then living in the RV, where space was super tight. We have made a list of things that we said all the time in the RV, but  we won’t be saying anymore:

“Will you get some bread out of the microwave?” “No, there’s none left, check the shower”
“How were the showers?”
“Are the showers free?”
“Did you dot us?”
“Where’s my I pad?” “It’s in the shower charging”
“Will you change the bed into a table?”
“Get your sleeping bag from the bathroom”
“I’m going outside to get pasta from the Thule”
“Tomorrow is a driving day”
“What day is it?”
“Will you write it on the fridge?”
“Where are we?”
“We’re going to toad up!”
“Can I get my drum out of the bathroom?”
“Will you turn Honey on?”

Now you probably don’t know what any of this means, but these were common sentences in the RV.

Our traveling days may be over for now, but we know this won’t be the last adventure for the billygoats.

We spent four days in the hottest place in the world: Death Valley. We explored the salt flats at Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America, at 285 feet below sea level. When we pulled up, Little Kid looked outside and said “snow!” The salt really did look like snow!

We spent one day hiking through Mosaic Canyon, a beautiful canyon with marble sides. We had to do a little rock scrambling to get over some dry waterfalls. It would have been easy if the rock hadn’t been super slick. On the way back, we had lots of fun sliding down the rock slides.

We also hiked through Desolation Canyon, which was well named. The only land animal we saw was a spider. There weren’t many plants either. It was just a whole lot of nothing. The hike started out great, except for one part where we lost the trail and ended up climbing through rocky side canyons. Our hike took a strange turn when the trail ended on the road. We walked down the road, thinking that the trail would pick up again. But there was no trail, so we decided to just hike back to the car on the road. It was quite a long hike, and towards the end, Ma ran ahead to get the car. We were all very tired from our six mile hike.

One day, we took a break from hiking to go swimming in the swimming pool at a nearby hotel. Ma and Pa thought it was too cold to swim, but Little Kid and I had an awesome time.

Our last hike in Death Valley was Golden Canyon. It was a short hike, but pretty. I spent a lot of time exploring small side canyons and scrambling up onto ridges.