The First Stop

Summer is slipping past SO quickly and I have so many summery adventures that I wanted to share! I can't believe I STILL haven't written about the highlight of my summer... I think it's probably because there are just SO many pictures that it is just a tad overwhelming! Haha... for now I will just write about the first bit of our trip...

As most of you know Mike and I packed our bags and headed down South on a roadtrip to California back in May! It was awesome... so random and so wonderful! We drove through Idaho first and planned to camp the first night in Spokane, Washington -but it turns out we got into Spokane just a bit too late. The campground closed it's gate 5 minutes early and we missed our chance! We decided to drive through the night and get to our destination SOONER. After Mike drove all that he could drive I would take over and drive all that I could drive. We found a nice rest stop on the side of the road that made for a great quick sleep.

When Mike woke up, he drove us all the way into Oregon where we finally got out of the car around noon the next day at a Safeway. We picked up some dinner rolls and a roasted chicken for breakfast/lunch and ate on a picnic bench in the parking lot. I know I know... we live the high life! Lol... (we went on our trip with the challenge to spend less than $500 for our entire 10 days!!)

While walking through Safeway and getting pumped about all the foreign brand names, Cherry Coke, and wine in the grocery store... I picked up one of my favorite bottles from Oregon and suggested we buy it for our first night at the camp site. It was Sokol Blosser's "Evolution" . Mike reminded me of our strict budget (which he often has to do) and we were excited when we noticed just how cheap they sell wine in the states for! We picked ourselves up a bottle of Cabernet/Merlot from Argentina for $4.50. Yes... that's right. $4.50. We were pretty proud of ourselves. We also filled our cooler with all of the basics- milk, eggs, bread, angel hair pasta, tomato sauce, and peanut butter.
(along with a few other random items we pulled from our cupboards at home.)

While I was looking at the label of Evolution I noticed that the wine was made in Dundee, Oregon.

When we got to the cashier I thought I'd ask about Dundee and see if the winery happened to be along our route to the west coast. We really weren't expecting much. When the cashier responded "just take a right at the next lights." I think my jaw dropped. We were only minutes from one of my favorite wineries!!

The vineyard was beautiful. The rows of grapes went further than I could see! Hills and Hills full of little grapes. We got to the tasting room and shared a flight and shared our stories of serving evolution to customers back in Calgary. The lady helping us mentioned that they just happened to be bottling that day and took us on a little tour.

The bottling took place in this tiny little trailer out back of the warehouse. I couldn't believe how small the space was that is used to bottle hundreds of thousands of bottles!

Boxes and more boxes of Evolution


I think that I would enjoy living in that little red house on a gigantic vineyard.

Tiny little grapes. They aren't harvested until late summer.

Well it turns out that Mike and I DID get to enjoy that lovely bottle of Evolution on the first night of camp after all.

We stayed on the first stretch of the Oregon Trail at the Honey Bear Campground. Just across the street from our campsite was a gorgeous stretch of white sand beach and roaring waves! I could hear the sound of the waves collapsing from our tent. Ahhhh.... relaxation.