Cloudy Pass

Jake and Emily are spending the week together hiking in the North Cascades. Click here for photos from their 24-mile backpacking adventure from Holden Village to Cloudy Pass. It lived up to its name.

Prior to Emily's trip north to see Jake, we had a chance to continue a family tradition of seeing Cirque du Soleil when they come to Portland. The sky in the photos below was yellow from wildfire smoke. Fortunately, the air quality was better in Holden Village for the twin's hike.

Hood to Coast

Congrats to Drew, Grace and their team for running this year's Hood to Coast Relay Race, which started at Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood and ended 198 miles later on the beach in Seaside. Click here for photos. 

Meanwhile here in Portland, we had a fun reunion with our good friends Tim and Di while they were visiting from New Mexico.

Hiking Around in Washington State

Spent last week with Jake exploring some new - and revisiting favorite - spots around the Olympic Peninsula and in the Mt. Baker National Forest just east of Seattle. Click here for photos. We timed the tides wrong to make it to the Sequim Lighthouse, but still took a walk along the Dungeness Spit Trail, pictured below, a place we last visited in 2010.

A highlight of our week was a reunion with Jake's friend Teis and his family at their new home on Bainbridge Island. 

Drew and Grace were recently in Holden Village and are pictured below with Jake and Grace's mom Sarah, hiking to Hart Lake. 

Drew, Emily and Grace were also in Seattle recently helping see their friend Emma off for her first Seattle to Portland bike race.

For more photos of our summer so far, click the following links: 

• Portland 
• Holden
• Sri Lanka*

* Pat will be back in September, in time to enjoy fall in Oregon. 

Summer

We're on heat wave #2 and its barely July. The first was when Drew, Grace and I visited Indiana timed with temperatures in the high 90s. Now Portland is experiencing similarly high temperatures. Click here for photos from our trip tn Aurora, where Uncle John's pool provided a great break from the heat. 

And here are two additional albums of summer so far in Portland and Holden Village, including a video clip of Jake seeing a bear while hiking. 

Dragons on the Willamette

June is Rose Festival time in Portland, which includes the annual Starlight Parade, pictured below, and Dragon Boat Racing on the Willamette River, pictured above. We were there for both events, cheering on the Willamette Wave Riders, the team Emily paddles for and Drew tillers. Here are more Starlight Parade photos and a Dragon Boat Racing album. 

We got to see Jake and Elli for a few days in early June, when they were visiting from Holden, and we have been taking advantage of great weather for all things outdoors. CLICK HERE for some photos we took while sailing alongside Drew and Emily's dragon boat practice last week and enjoying the lovely garden Emily and Coleman have been cultivating. 

Racing has factored heavily into Drew's summer so far. He competed in the Oregon Off Shore, from Astoria, OR, to Victoria, BC, the Swift Shore, from Victoria, BC, to Cape Flattery, WA, and pictured below, the Harstine GT, a race around Harstine Island, WA, near Olympia, which Drew and Pat have now won two years in a row. CLICK HERE for lots of miscellaneous photos from May and June around Portland; AND HERE for photos of some of Jake's late spring/early summer adventures at Holden Village. 

Light Show

Hooray for Jake for capturing some amazing photos of the Northern Lights when they made a rare appearance in the Pacific Northwest.  Click here for more photos of Spring in Holden Village; and click here for Spring in and around Portland - including birthdays and boat races,

Our Week in Seoul

We had a busy week exploring the colors and chaos of Seoul, Korea - including temple and museum visits, several great hikes, and lots of long walks and subway rides to explore neighborhoods around the city. Our favorites areas included Insadong, Jongno, and Namsan, as well as the Cheonggyecheon Stream, an 11km urban walkway pictured below that runs through the city.

Here are some WATER FEATURE PHOTOS. Savit Island, pictured below is a great spot along the Han River to watch the nightly Banpo Rainbow Bridge fountain shows. Cheonggyecheon Stream's fountains and waterfalls also dance at night. 

Here are NAMSAN TOWER PHOTOS. Namsan Tower is the 2nd highest point in Seoul and sits at the geographic center of the city, offering great views in all directions and lovely forested trails on the way up.  At the top, all the railings are covered with love locks. 

Click here for HIKING PHOTOS. The hiking options around Seoul and related amenities were impressive - well kept trails and stairways, often carpeted with jute rugs; blowers at the end of trails if you want to dust off; safety resources for potential fires or medical emergencies; and great access to trailheads and urban green spaces via public transportation. Pictured below is a section of the hike along Seoul's City Wall. Constructed in the1300s and spanning 18km, the wall used to encircle the central city, and many sections remain intact. While hiking the wall, we stumbled across Iowa Mural Village. We also enjoyed seeing Seoul's impressive Outdoor Library, during one of our walks. 

We took lots of ART/ARCHITECTURE PHOTOS while visiting different neighborhoods and museums across Seoul and learned a few things along the way about the processes used by Korean artists to create elaborate lacquer boxes, like the one pictured below. One of the most impressive modern building we saw was the Dongdaemun Design Plaza. 

There was a dramatic mix of old and new across the city... and so many colorful lanterns everywhere! Here are TEMPLE PHOTOS to illustrate this point. We happened to visit Gyeongbokgung Palace on a free admission cultural day, so in addition to seeing a changing of the guard ceremony, we saw lots of locals (and tourists) dressed in traditional hanbok attire. 

Finally, here are DINING PHOTOS from a few street markets, restaurant rows and tea houses we visited, and of course, Korean BBQ. There were eating and shopping options literally around every corner, above and below ground. 

CLICK HERE for a comprehensive album with all the photos from our trip.