Tuesday, December 22, 2009
McMenamining It Up!
Has anyone ever stayed in a McMenamin's hotel? They are ridic (yeah, I'm cool. I can say words like wiggidy wack).
Marshall and I were first introduced to the McMenamin hotel chain when I went to a weekend women's retreat there and of course, the males tagged along.
We stayed at the Grand Lodge, which is in a Podunk town called Forest Grove (essentially just outside Portland). The McMenamin brothers (see family can get along) take old historical buildings and restore them to be cute hotels that retain their original character. The Grand Lodge was an old Masonic lodge. No, it's not filled with conspiracy nuts. But instead, it kept a lot of the old decor and spruced it with funky paintings, bars in rooms and a movie theater with couches. The charm of the place is irresistible. Seriously, I dare you to go there and NOT love it.
Reasons why I love McMenamins. 1. The halls magically smell like lavender but I never see any plants. 2. They usually have large properties where you can play golf, Frisbee golf and drink beer. It's like a classier Vegas. 3. They shove little bars into little nooks and crannies. It's like a scavenger hunt. 4. They always have outside music and fires in the summer months. 5. The hot tub is ridic!! 6. The food is incredible. The servers have ALWAYS been good. We've been about a billion times and I have never over exaggerated anything in my entire life. 7. The decor is soooo unique that you spend most of the time just walking around and looking at things (with beer or wine in your hand). 8. The mentioned above movie theater which you can drink and eat in. 9. It's just fun. Seriously it is like Disneyland for weekend awayers! 10. You could pay $120 for some generic Hilton hotel room with beige this and beige that or you can pay quite a bit less (depending on what hotel you stay in) and have some fun... without having to leave the hotel.
What we love about the ones we've been: Edgefield (the biggest) has a large property to walk around on (while drinking, of course). It has a great little shed that is a cigar barn. I love the smell of cigars but hate the act of smoking. My favorite place is the front porch, which is lined with old rocking chairs. Also the spa pools are ridic! Grand Lodge is pretty much the one we stay at the most because well, it's the cheapest. No really, it's a smoking good deal. It has a great Frisbee golf course in which I beat my husband every time. It also has a great yard house that has records all over the ceiling. Marshall and I play a "name that record" game. I pretty much lose after the Spice Girls. Olympic Club is in Centralia, WA. It is on Main St, which is lined with antique stores. We usually only stay in this one passing through. We love that it has a pool hall in which I beat my husband every time (thank goodness he is not reading this). It also has a great movie & concert venue. We really want to stay in all of them.
They are also building one in our hometown of Tacoma, WA (Holla, 253). Marshall and I fully intended to take the bus there from our house and stay the weekend. Once we figure out what to do with the kid and the dogs (leave them at home????).
We are long overdue for a McMenamins getaway. Stay tuned for an update!
P.S. It’s kid friendly. Once we found McMenamin’s, we took a deep breath and said, “Okay, we can have a kid and be happy”. Nothing is beige!
We stayed at the Grand Lodge, which is in a Podunk town called Forest Grove (essentially just outside Portland). The McMenamin brothers (see family can get along) take old historical buildings and restore them to be cute hotels that retain their original character. The Grand Lodge was an old Masonic lodge. No, it's not filled with conspiracy nuts. But instead, it kept a lot of the old decor and spruced it with funky paintings, bars in rooms and a movie theater with couches. The charm of the place is irresistible. Seriously, I dare you to go there and NOT love it.
Reasons why I love McMenamins. 1. The halls magically smell like lavender but I never see any plants. 2. They usually have large properties where you can play golf, Frisbee golf and drink beer. It's like a classier Vegas. 3. They shove little bars into little nooks and crannies. It's like a scavenger hunt. 4. They always have outside music and fires in the summer months. 5. The hot tub is ridic!! 6. The food is incredible. The servers have ALWAYS been good. We've been about a billion times and I have never over exaggerated anything in my entire life. 7. The decor is soooo unique that you spend most of the time just walking around and looking at things (with beer or wine in your hand). 8. The mentioned above movie theater which you can drink and eat in. 9. It's just fun. Seriously it is like Disneyland for weekend awayers! 10. You could pay $120 for some generic Hilton hotel room with beige this and beige that or you can pay quite a bit less (depending on what hotel you stay in) and have some fun... without having to leave the hotel.
What we love about the ones we've been: Edgefield (the biggest) has a large property to walk around on (while drinking, of course). It has a great little shed that is a cigar barn. I love the smell of cigars but hate the act of smoking. My favorite place is the front porch, which is lined with old rocking chairs. Also the spa pools are ridic! Grand Lodge is pretty much the one we stay at the most because well, it's the cheapest. No really, it's a smoking good deal. It has a great Frisbee golf course in which I beat my husband every time. It also has a great yard house that has records all over the ceiling. Marshall and I play a "name that record" game. I pretty much lose after the Spice Girls. Olympic Club is in Centralia, WA. It is on Main St, which is lined with antique stores. We usually only stay in this one passing through. We love that it has a pool hall in which I beat my husband every time (thank goodness he is not reading this). It also has a great movie & concert venue. We really want to stay in all of them.
California Road Trippen and Oregon Coastin'
The great road trip!
Marshall and I decided to spend spring break at my sister's place in San Jose. We drove directly there and then spent a few days with them and then took the longest route possible back- the oregon coast. This is that journey!
Spring break occurs after a gruelling week of exams and papers. When it was time to go... I was ready! As a full time student, who also worked full time to support myself, I needed a vacation. Marshall, my then live-in bf, was also excited to go. We decided to take our two puppies with us; Taj and Hannity. They have been on road trips before. Hannity is a classic snoozer during road trips. She immediately falls asleep and sleeps for the next 14 hours. Taj, not so much. He is a pacer. He won't even sit down.
Marshall and I listen to some great road trippen songs. Really it's the music that sets the mood. We play Sublime and Jack Johnson. Of course we argue over the ipod. Marshall wants Led Zepplin and I want to listen to Corrine Bailey Rae (I win!).
We get to Salem, OR and we are famished! We assume this would be a cool place to stop. I mean the name is cool right? Well after being frustrated by a maze of one way streets and our growling sotmachs, we find a cafe. Well we think it is a cafe. It looks more like a furniture store.
Back on the road, we are flying down the I-5. Marshall and I like to take life at different speeds. He is the type to drive 5 over the speed limit and well I drive way over the speed limit. When he tells me to slow down... I scoff. I've never had a speeding ticket! I am a master at illuding the cops.
We get into California after snickering at the "Weed's" sign. We, however, after 14 hours of non-stop driving get lost in the great San Franciso area. There are lights and cars and confusion!!! We finally get to Rachel and Aaron house and collapse.
Our dogs have made a new friend. Rachel has a dog named Trilo (short for trilobite). He is still a puppy but has outgrown both of my black labs. He runs and jumps on them and tries to shove toys in their mouths. After some warming up time, they are running circles around the house, destroying everything in their path.
My sister Sarah is also in town for the first few days. She is a school teacher in Houston. Only my sister Debbie is not there and how we miss her. I love my sisters and have many wild stories with them. We spend time chatting and playing games. We drink coffee and relax with books. We catch up on the craziness that is our lives.
Aaron and Rachel take us to the San Jose flea market. People are pushing buggies and shopping carts in line to get in. I am speechless. Rows and rows of people selling everthing from cars to crap (not literal crap). We turn over knick knacks and shop for fresh produce. There is even a tent for just eggs. We get items to make a delicious meal.
I find myself with a python wrapped around my neck. The man put it there and then tried to talk me into buying it. Weridly enough, I wasn't that afraid. Perhaps I am more reptile friendly then I though. Flashback to collecting garderner snakes as a child and putting them in my sisters bed.
I am sunbrunt! big surprise! many sunburns in my lifetime. We go to San Franciso the next day. We walked on the pier and got some clam chowder. We watch as the bush man scares innocent passerbyers. Since I have fallen prey to the bush man on a previous trip. I knew what to expect. If you don't know what I am talking about, just you tube the bush man in san francisco.
We go on a tour to Alcatraz and hatch escape plans. We walk around the island and take the audio tour of the jail. Cheesy photos of us posing in the jail cells, one on the toliet :) We then walked to China town. After a specific lunch incident in which we were swindled out of our money (you know who you are), we all ran and lost each other. I ended up in a seedy bar, looking timid and afrad. Thank god for cell phones!! We reunited to shop and shop some more. We went into store after store of Chinese themed gifts. My mission was to find some silk chinese slippers.
Finally pooped from the walking and the San Franciso hills, we went home to play "Cooking with Mama" on the WII. Please note that apparently my cooking skills are as bad as my viedo gaming skills.
Marshall and I said goodbye to my sisters and Aaron and started the drive home. We took the old highway by the Oregon Coast and were awed by the rocky coastline. We stayed in a A-Frame hut on the beach and the puppies ran and ran.
We discovered the joys of Newport, OR and the Rougue Brewery. We feasted on the best calamari in the world and comparable beer. Since then, we've gone back to Rogue establishments but have been cursed, since they have been out of the calamari ever since. We call it the calamari curse!
We know it's ridiculous but we pay too much money to go see Ripley's Believe It or Not. However, I am amused. What can I say? I am easily entertained! The rest of the journey home is filled with relaxation, books and wine. We returned home rested and I unfortunately went back to working too much, studying a lot and playing too less.
First Travels....
My traveling experience began when my parents would load all of us children (I am the youngest of four girls) into the hot, stinky Toyota van. My parents where missionary Baptist folk (Yes, I am a PK-Preacher's Kid). We would have to go to a large conference every year for the American Baptist Association (Yawn!). Why would a bunch of Canadians be going to a conference in the U.S.?
Because my family is comprised of halfies. We are half Canadian and half American. I was born and raised in Courtenay, B.C. and am Canadian thru and thru. However, I live in Tacoma, WA (more on that later).
Back to the point. Although we were never really in a rush, my dad would make us leave at 3am. Some of us were content to pile into the van with our jammies and sleep until a proper hour. Others (like me) would bounce up and down on the seats, excited for the adventures to come.
The first adventure was always taking the ferry. Because we lived on the island, we had to take a two hour ferry ride. I remember hoping that we would get the new ferries that were sleek, have video games and didn't make me seasick. But no... we always got the New Westminister, which was the oldest boat in the fleet. Ironic since new is in it's name.
On the ferry, we were given full rights to run around and act like hooligans. My parents would hide themselves and probably mentally prepare for the trip ahead. Moments of silence and mediation were non-existent for them. We are loud girls! We would always get breakfast, play some video games, flip through magazines in the gift shop (which we'd never buy), and run screaming on the deck. The wind would be so strong! I am surprised that we never floated away.
I would always sleep when we got back into the van. I was usually in a sugar coma (since we had no parental supervision and a allowance). Next came the border. It always mystified me how one little sign could say "You are in the United States".
We would always head off into a new direction. Sometimes we would drive south and then east and then north and then west. Some stops where a sure thing every trip! Like going to Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico. We would wonder through the dark cold caves looking at stalagmites. I always liked the gift store. It would be full of native American trinkets. I would buy a dreamcatcher or some rattle snake eggs (I always fell for the tricks).
We would always go visit my grandparents in Midland, Texas. No offense, but even as a young girl, I knew that Texas was not for me. It was hot. It was flat and dusty and not really much to do. And you had to check everything for rattlers (I was interested in getting some REAL snake eggs though). Our activities there would include watching old movies that my grandma would pirate (the good ole' days of VCR and recording TV movies). She had cabinets and cabinets of black VCR tapes and sticky labels. Another favorite past-time included playing tetrius on the computer. My sister, Rachel would always have the high scores. I blame her for my poor video gaming skills. The last fun place we would go was the water park. It seemed eons away but we would always get there as it opened. I remember being so irritated when everyone dragged their heels to leave. I just wanted to get there already!
Reflecting on those long road trips, I feel fortunate to have been able to go so many places and had so many fun experiences. Some of my favorite memories comes from these adventures that we had every summer. For example, my sisters and I would trade off reading some Harlequin romance novels. We would have to be so stealth and hide it from our parents. If they knew, we would have been toast!
I have a long history of getting car sick. Crammed into a toyota mountaineer van with no AC, riding on top of luggage, did not make me feel any better. I was constantly sticking my head out the window, as my sisters watched my throw up fly by the window.
My favorite story is after going to Disneyland. My sister, Rachel (kind of my Nemesis as a child but I love her now) bought a beautiful Minnie mouse doll. She used up a good portion of her money to purchase the doll and a large sucker. She proudly displayed the mouse in front of us on the "hump" (If you've ever been in the mountaineer, you know what I am talking about). The doll had a beautiful silk kimono on. As she stared at Minnie with love filled eyes, I projectile vomit on poor Minnie and the giant lollipop. It took a long time for my sister to forgive me, although she got me back in many ways.
I feel so lucky to have gone on these trips. It made me realize what a family really means. It also opened my eyes to the different lives all contained in a country. From the rolling ranches in Montana, to a gas station in Mississippi and to the alligator road kill in Florida. These trips were the building blocks of my thirst for travelling. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of the trip!!
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