pacific northwest

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Going through some images from the archives, I found this one from Ecola State Park overlooking Cannon Beach in Oregon from August of last year. Our trip to Oregon had to be one of my favorites from 2019. It’s a place that I had never been too, but still constantly think about just because of how beautiful it was.

On our first morning on the coast, Andrew and I woke up early to catch the sunrise. Frankie was still in bed. LOL. So we made our way to Ecola State Park to catch one of the best views along the coast. I am so glad I was able to get the drone up for a little bit as the sun was coming over the horizon. The pastel colors that the early morning light created is probably my favorite part of this image.

I CANT WAIT to go back. I just don’t know when that will be though.

My camera settings for this image are F2.2 at 1/400thh sec and ISO 400 with my DJI Mavic Pro.

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One place that I’d love to be in the fall time would be Oregon. Gah, I seriously loved visiting the state. It was amazing in the late summer. I can’t even imagine what it would be like in the fall or even spring.

This image was taken along the Drift Creek Falls Hike. Towards the end of the hike, you have to cross this suspension bridge in order to see the waterfall. It actually flows right underneath so the views start when you’re on the bridge. It was a little shakey which made me a bit nervous, but Andrew seemed to have no problems with it. He had no hesitation when I asked him to go back to the center of the bridge and walk back.

I think my favorite part of this image (besides Andrew) is the framing of the leaves. If I didn’t look at it through my camera lens, I probably would have not noticed how perfectly they frame the bridge. I especially like how the leaves in the front are glowing yellow while the trees in the back are so dark green. It makes it look like a really long bridge, which it was! And I actually kinda like the bright lens flare on the top left. I think it adds even more direction in the image that leads your eye to Andrew.

My camera settings for this image are F9 at 1/125th sec and ISO 640 with my Sony A7II and 24-70mm lens.

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I feel in love with Oregon. I loved every minute we were there. I felt so at peace and calm during our whole road trip across the state, I would highly recommend it to anyone who’s considering visiting the Pacific Northwest.

The real reason we went was to celebrate my birthday and to visit a place we had never been to. Portland was a city that both Andrew and I had heard was a fun place to be but never been. But we also knew it was the place to be if you like good food and weird things. Both did not disappoint!

Since this was our first time visiting Oregon, we didn’t really know what to expect. We’ve been back for less than a month, I already know of somethings that I would do differently. With that said, we will be back again. Both Andrew and I left with the feeling of wanting to see and do more. But I think that’s the sign of an amazing trip. Prior to the trip, I did tons of research on the Oregon coast on Pinterest and asked some friends who I knew had visited before. Through my research, I quickly realized that Oregon is a very dog-friendly state. Minus Crater Lake that doesn’t allow dogs in most areas of the park, Frankie was allowed everywhere else we wanted to go. So we booked 3 plane tickets off we went!

Here is a recap of everything we did and the things I would do differently next time:

Day 1: Fly into Portland

We arrived early in the afternoon, grabbed our rental car and went straight to pick up the essentials: Blue Star Donuts. I know I don’t normally give food recommendations but if you like fancy donuts, then Blue Star is where you want to be. I’ll have another donut recommendation later on our trip that ended up being our favorite.

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While planning for our trip to Oregon, Toketee Falls was high on my list of things to do. It looked so beautiful from all the pictures I saw and the best part about it is that the hike wasn’t too far. It was the perfect stop on our way to Bend, Oregon to get out and stretch our legs for a bit.

What you don’t see from all the Instagram and Pinterest posts is that this place is PACKED! Out of all the places we went to, this was by far the hardest place to find parking and the busiest trail. There were several times where we had to wait for people to pass in order to continue on to the trail. Regardless of how many people were there, it was still very cool to see and I’d recommend if you are in the area.

Although this was technically not on the trail, it looked like it could have been a short detour. There were a lot of people who were climbing around these rocks that Andrew and I decided to go down to see what it looked like. As Andrew was exploring, I captured this of him and Frankie. Yep, that’s Frank in the red backpack. He’s just not looking at the camera. LOL.

My camera settings for this image are F9 at 1/20th sec and ISO 1000 with my Sony A7II and 24-70mm.

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By the way, I’m working on an Oregon road trip post with everything we did in the week we visited. Reflecting back on the trip, there were definitely a few things that I would have done differently and discussed that in the post. If you have any other questions about Oregon, please let me know. I’ll try my best to answer them.

In the meantime, I’ve been enjoying going through the images from the trip. It’s been sort of a slow process but I’ve been really happy with the results so far. Especially this one for some reason. By the time we arrived at Myers Creek Beach Viewpoint, the sun had already been up for a while. It wasn’t the middle of the day but we could definitely feel the heat from the sun. It made for harsh lighting conditions so I was a little bit hesitant to even attempt to edit this image. I remember being so excited about the water reflections in the sand that I started shooting right when I got out of the car. I captured this just steps away from the rental in the parking lot.  Although you can’t see any reflections, you can tell how glassy and still the water was. OMG

My camera settings for this image is F6.3 at 1/800th sec and ISO 320 with my Sony A7II and 24-70mm lens.

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We spent 2 nights in Portland at the end of our trip. It was definitely necessary because no matter how much Andrew loves me, he’s way more of a city boy than someone who would want to spend the entire trip in nature. Which is completely fine with me. I enjoy both.

This was taken on our last full day of the trip. We decided to head to Pittock Mansion to watch the sunrise but it was so foggy that you could barely see anything. So I quickly shifted the idea from taking landscape images to more people images. For a Monday morning, I was surprised to see at least 10 other people at this location. But I’m glad they were there because it gave me plenty of opportunities to create different kinds of images. I believe these two were checking out the images they had just captured on their camera but they were so close to each other that it looked like it could have been a loving embrace. I love how they are silhouetted and the only color you see is from the city.

Next time I visit Portland, I’m going to have to come here during the day. Not only was the view amazing but Pittock Mansion itself looks like it would have been really cool on the inside. And there will be a next time. I think Andrew and I both agreed that we didn’t have enough time in Portland or Oregon in general. There’s still so much more to explore!

My camera settings for this image are F4.5 at 1/10th sec and ISO 800 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.