After finishing our hike on the lost coast we headed north planning on spending a week or so making our way to Corvallis to visit with my parents. We soon discovered two things; the first being that spring had not fully arrived to the northern California Coast, the second was that Alexis had contracted a rather good case of "mystery rash" on her arms and legs. We drove along the coast through the town nice town of Ferndale and then on to Eureka where Alexis, sporting her now rather alarming rash, go us a deal at a hotel by saying that her mean husband was going to make her camp out in the woods if the hotel was too expensive (this might of been true). We went and located some Tecnu (poison oak wash) and Mexican food and called it a night. The following day we drove through, and hiked in, the redwoods and then drove into Oregon where we found a great free campsite with a picnic table next to a stream. We made a great dinner and had a fire (my wet-wood fire starting skills have greatly diminished from my time in Arizona).
The next morning we headed to Bandon and stopped for a couple of nice walks on the beach. Walked around the town of Bandon and found chocolate covered blueberries and some pretty good fish and chips. Alexis's rash was continuing to get worse so we kept stopping in all the drug stores to try and find some Zenfel (the stuff is $40/oz but is supposed to work wonders on poison oak). We had no luck finding it and spent the night camped on an old logging road in the hills. It was a rainy night with lots of mosquitoes so we turned in early. After checking 5 pharmacies in Reedsport we finally located the Zenfel. We where going to do some hiking and possible backpacking in the Oregon Dunes but Alexis's rash kept getting worse and it was raining so we took a walk on the beach and drove up to Newport for some clam chowder at Mo's (if you click this link be prepared for some pretty sweet music!) and some beer over at the Rouge Brew House. We decided that, because of the weather and rash situations, we would head over to my parents house a couple of days early and reorganize our truck and rest up.
At my parents house we unloaded our truck and started buying all the supplies that we might need to get to Alaska and back. I made a big batch of pancake mix and then in the same spirit made some granola. I decided that a quadruple batch of granola would be best, so after several hours we were the proud owners of 15+ pounds of granola...I think we'll be pretty sick of granola before we're through. The Zenfel really didn't do much, if anything, for Alexis's rash so after wasting hours trying to locate a Urgent Care center and talking with our insurance company, who clearly stated that they would not cover any Urgent Care centers in the area, we headed off the the emergency room (maybe this is why health insurance is so expensive!). The doctor, of course, told us what we already knew "contacted dermatitis of unknown origin" and wrote a prescription for oral steroids that cost us a whopping $2.21. She seems to be healing up now but I'm nervous waiting for her to flip out in a "Roid Rage".
With my parents we went up to the Evergreen Aviation Museum to check out all the planes they have and look at the Spruce Goose. The museum was really nice and the Goose is incredibly large. On the way back to Corvallis we hit a couple of wineries for tastings. We had a great time with my parents and are now fully stocked and reorganized (I'm not sure if we could fit any more food in our truck if we tried). We are headed across Central Oregon to meet or friends Amy and Taylor to do some canoeing/hiking/rafting on the Green River where hopefully the weather is warm!
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