VICTORIAN VILLAGE OF FERNDALE

Ok, so last night I said no more posts - that that one would be my last post of the trip. Well, things have changed...

Today I woke up and I wanted to do what I said yesterday (about exercising on the beach in the morning), but I didn't wake up in time for that. We had to get an early start because it takes about 14 hours to get from Gold Beach, Oregon back to Hemet, California.

So we're driving down the road, same route that we got there, and all of a sudden we reach Ferndale. My dad said he remembers reading about a victorian village around there, so we looked up exactly where it was and found it: The Victorian Village of Ferndale.

I thought it was the cutest thing. The buildings, shops, everything. We parked the car, got out and walked around. We had lunch at Ferndale Pizza Co. After lunch, my brother and I went into the vintage-style candy store, just because we liked the theme and setup of the place (he's not a fan of sweets either), but yet, we left with candy. Honeyduke's to be exact. We couldn't resist. We got the chocolate frog and Bertie Bott's. For anyone who has never had Bertie Bott's flavor beans, they are...oh how do you say it...disgusting! There's flavors like vomit and earwax. Bad things is...they taste exactly what you would think they would taste like. So yes, they're not what you would think someone would want to buy and actually consume. But we like to get them occasionally, you know, just because we're weird and major Harry Potter fans. We like to play games to see who can eat them without having to wash it down with water. That can get challenging. 

The village itself has nothing much in it, but the buildings are so attractive and photogenic. Plus it was a good place to stop and stretch our legs from sitting in the car so long.

NESIKA SUNSETS

Well, today was our last day in Oregon. It seems like it went by so fast! Today nothing much happened other than spending the day with family, packing, and visiting the beach. Since this was our last day, my father and I went to the beach twice: once during the day and one once in the evening to catch the sunset.  The orange tones that illuminated the sky were just mesmerizing. Sunsets by the beach are so beautiful.

One thing I've always wanted to do, which I don't know why I never did since this was the perfect opportunity, is exercise on the beach. Preferably early in the morning when there's not a lot of people there (if any) and watch the sunrise while you're exercising. I think it would be fun to do yoga or go on a jog in the sand, the water washing up on your feet every now and again. That would have been so refreshing. I had the perfect opportunity, because our vacation rental was only a five minute walk from the beach, and I didn't even think about it until now. I have to keep this in mind for the next time I ever vacation by the beach.

Tomorrow we're just going to be on the road all day, so no more posts. I hope you have enjoyed my posts from my trip. Good night everyone!

BATTLE ROCK CAVES

To Port Orford we go!

Today began with a workout. Something quick: 50 squats, 100 crunches, 20 pushups. Nothing really to work up a good sweat, but it counted as something! My workout was followed by a shower, bowl of strawberries, a game of Skip-Bo, and a trip to the Battle Rock caves in Port Orford. We found out about this place from the pamplets in the office at our rental property. 

It was about a 10-15 minute drive to our destination. The first thing I wanted to do was not to visit the caves yet, but to climb this huge rock/boulder thing. So my brother and sister tagged along and after about 30 minutes, our father had to climb up to see what we were up to. We were just sitting there, enjoying the view of the water from up above. 

I thought the caves were going to be some gnarly thing, but when we got around to it, it was just a quick in and out. It's not worth going out of your way for, but it was fine since this was the only thing on our to-do list for the day. 

West Coast Game Safari Park | BANDON, OR

Today was probably one of my favorite outings in Oregon. My brother, sister, step-mother, father, and I drove to Bandon, about a 30 minute trip from Gold Beach, to visit the West Coast Game Safari Park. It's like a little zoo, but my favorite part is that all the animals are out of an enclosure (except the bears, tigers, monkeys, and a few more critters). Right when we arrived, there were deers there to greet us and a few moments later, a group of goats came to say hello. I instantly fell in love with this place. I don't like zoos because you look at an animal, maybe take a few pictures then go to the next animal, and maybe see a show every now and then. But what I like about this safari park is that you get to feed, hold, and interact with the animals. 

After making our way past the deer and goats, we found an apricot skunk that we were able to hold. Next we got to hold a opossum, which was pretty big and kind of heavy, and then held a white ferret afterwards. After my siblings and I took turns passing the animals around, we waited in line to play with a baby tiger. The tiger was pretty lively. He even had little cat toys to play with! When it was our turn, my brother, sister, and I got on the floor and started petting him and when I reached down to touch him, the tiger rolled on his back, grabbed my hand, put it in his mouth and started gnawing on it! Luckily it didn't hurt. 

We only had about 3 minutes with the baby tiger, so when our time was up, we walked around to see what else we could see. We noticed most people were holding sugar cones with food pellets inside. We wondered what that was all about until we realized it was food for the animals. Each cone was 50 cents, and after we purchased ours, that's when the deer came running to us. It's like they have a radar that knows who has the food. We fed the deer and goats, and all of a sudden, out of no where, a huge llama comes walking behind us! It startled us at first. We tried to pet him but he wouldn't stop walking as if he had some place he needed to be. Some rams got a little carried away throughout the day. My sister ran out of food, so they came over to me, hit me with their horns to get my attention, and when they saw I didn't have food either, they went back to my sister and cornered her. She had to block them with her bag. They really like that food! 

We saw some tigers, bears and monkeys, but they were all kept in enclosures, so we were only able to take a few snaps, say hello, and observe them a bit. My favorite animal that was there were the donkeys. I think I spent about two hours with just one of them. This donkey never left my side and fell asleep on me a couple of times while I was petting him. We totally had a connection.