California, Portland & Seattle Girls' Trip

Alright y'all (OMG, I'm so southern now...), today I want to tell you guys about my recent girls' trip I took to California, Oregon and Washington a couple months back. It was an event-filled 9 days, but it was worth the hustle and months of planning. Two of my other girlfriends, all Wisconsin grown but now living states apart, met me out in California and we engaged in a week plus of hiking, wine drinking and city slickin'. All in all, I think it was the perfect mashup for a girls' trip, so if any of my readers are considering ideas for a girls' getaway in their future, you should certainly consider this!

Part 1: Yosemite National Park

I've been to a hefty handful of National Parks so far, but I think Yosemite just might be my favorite. It really stands out from the rest and is beyond beautiful. And man, does it make you feel small! Pictures can't elaborate this. Seeing as we went in April, we had both pros and cons to the timing or our visit. The biggest benefit was that we were hiking during a time of year where all the snow was starting to melt off the mountain tops due to spring approaching, so the waterfalls throughout the park were extremely lush. This made the experience that much more astonishing. The hiking temperatures were also very nice and mellow. During the day, the high temps reached to right around 60 degrees, which made it cool enough so that we weren't hiking in blistering heat.

The biggest downfall to hiking Yosemite during April, however, is that there were a lot of closures due to ice still being present throughout certain areas of the park. Glacier Point road was closed down and the trail leading up to it had a lot of snow and ice that made the climb a little risky. Hiking up to Vernal and Nevada falls was also kind of dangerous because once we hit Mist Trail, there were shards of ice everywhere. Another misfortune was that we weren't able to visit Tuolumne Meadows, because the road was closed for the season. Regardless, we had a wonderful three days of hiking in the park! Below shows our three day itinerary and which hikes we partook in each day if you want a little information on which hikes to hit during your visit.

Day 1: Vernal and Nevada Falls via Mist Trail

This was a relatively easy hike, and is recommended to do on days where you're either sore or don't have a lot of time. We picked this hike because we arrived in the park later than expected on our first day and didn't want to begin a 10 mile hike around 11AM. These falls are located at the back end of the park (far east side) and take you up to Vernal Falls first through mist trail. This is where we ended up stopping, because as I mentioned, it was straight ice after this point, and I'm not the most stable person to be walking on ice, on a misty trail, around 4PM when the sun starts to set below the cliff tops. This is a great trail for pictures, though. The way the sun hits Vernal falls is perfect and you're almost guaranteed to see a beautiful rainbow formed right in the middle of the falls.

Day 2: Four Mile Trail up past Union Point

Today was a little bit harder of a hike but had amazing views of the park as a whole. We started at the bottom of four mile trail thinking we would only make it up to Union Point (as we were informed it was closed passed this point due to snow and ice). Well I'm still not certain where exactly Union Point was located, but I'm pretty confident we went passed it. Along this hike we had an amazing angle of "Tunnel View" from the opposite end, as well as a great view of Yosemite Falls from across the valley. When we got about 3 miles up, we encountered an area where a bunch of snow and trees had fallen over, in which most people turned around and ventured back down. We had to use some athleticism to essentially slide over this "hump" so that we could keep going. Honestly, probably not in our best interest and was slightly terrifying, but hey, I'm still here right?! We hiked a little ways up until we could capture a candid "naked nature" picture overlooking the valley. Did you know that's the new thing nowadays?!? Sorry, won't be showing those pics on my blog. The hike this day totaled around 8 miles.

Day 3: Upper Yosemite Falls

Our last day was unexpectedly our hardest, by far. We endured a 10 mile hike (round-trip) up to the Upper Yosemite Falls lookout point. I had the worst blisters on my feet at this point and it was excruciating trying to fit hiking boots on, but I was only in the park for 3 days and I wasn't about to back out on finding the best views. This day was hotter than our previous hikes (of course), but still not terrible (around 70 degrees). A few miles in, we came up right next to the Yosemite waterfall, and it was breathtaking. The drop was pretty steep, and it almost looked like the water was turning into snow on its fall down. We kept pushing forward and a few hours later we reached the top. And... wow. The views from the top of the waterfall were unreal. Every second that I had wished we weren't doing that stupid hike on our last day with my torn up feet, I immediately dismissed. We were offered a beautiful view of Half Dome, Glacier Point and the valley 2,425 feet below. Also, the top of the mountain was covered in snow, which was a nice cool down from the vigorous hike. This route is a definite must when visiting the park!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fzKHmMkLRA

Part 2: Wine Country

I'm half convinced wine country is the second happiest place on earth (next to Costa Rica). Realistically, who wouldn't be happy sippin wine all day, every day?? The people here were so nice. Everybody we ran into was happy. Everybody was having fun. The one mistake we made was not staying long enough. We had two full days planned for wine country that we split between Napa Valley and Sonoma, and that simply did not allow us enough time. Most wineries close around 4 or 5, and it's not exactly like you're doing a pub crawl where you pop in and out of wineries at a pretty quick rate. Every winery we stopped at, we ended up spending a good hour at each. We sampled the wines, learned about them, conversed with the workers and just enjoyed the day. At this rate, we were only able to hit maybe 5 wineries each day, and there are hundreds in the area. We definitely wished we had more time to explore and there are certainly some vineyards we missed the opportunity to stop at. So if you're ever planning a wine country vacation, I highly recommend doing at least 3 days or more. And start your days early. And make sure you remember to eat. Breakfast and lunch. Wine tasting is not a joke and it'll creep up on you.

My favorite wineries of our tour were Chateau St. Jean, Roger Roessler Wines, Silverado Vineyards and Ty Caton Winery. Chateau St. Jean was one of my favorites for the scenery alone. They had a lush vineyard full of flowers and many shades of green, which was the perfect backdrop for our wine tasting extravaganza. They had a nice little wine garden for the girls and me to kick back and relax in as well. Roger Roessler Wine Company was the first winery we stopped at in downtown Sonoma. Honestly, we were a few wineries deep at this point and I'm not 100% sure I loved the place for the wine, because I don't really recall how it tasted. However, I do remember my experience there, and it was delightful! The wine-tenders were so nice and so sweet, and there was a dog in the winery! And dogs make everything better, so hat's off to them.

Silverado Vineyards was the first stop we made in Napa Valley, and it was definitely an enjoyable experience for our very first wine country winery. The people were extremely nice. There was a little mix-up at first, because we were supposed to have a free tasting through my friend's boss who is a member, and even though they couldn't find this information initially, they still offered us a tasting for free. And mind you, free tastings are not a thing in Napa Valley, and typically range from $15-$25 a person. The people here accommodated us well and even gave us a free tour of the building, explaining the many posters that were used as the cover for their annual wine.

Finally, I really enjoyed Ty Caton Winery. It was really just a small wine store north of Sonoma, as the vineyard was located elsewhere. But I especially loved this winery because the wines tasted so good. Probably some of my favorite varieties of all the places we stopped (at least, that I can recall). Plus, they had an excellent Rose', and normally Rose' isn't my go-to. Additionally, the woman working that day that helped us out was really sweet, and from Wisconsin, so an extra bonus in our biased minds.

Another tip that I can offer if you're planning a trip to wine country is to check Groupon. We really didn't know where to start when it came to wine country because there were so many vineyards all over the place, how could we decide which would be the best places to stop at? Groupon offers several wine tasting packages for couples or groups of 4 that will give you nice discounts on tastings. Besides, it gave us a little direction on where to begin. After that, we were able to just go by word of mouth from our fellow wine-tenders on which wineries were the best to hit, and also which ones were open later. Because we never wanted the party to end.

Part 3: Portland, Oregon

So this was somewhat of a spontaneous add-on to the end of our girl's trip, because my New Yorker friend, Rhi, when looking at a very large map of the United States, thought San Francisco and Portland were a mere 3 hour drive apart. (San Francisco is where we began/ended our hiking/wine country trip). Of course, Portland is not three hours from San Francisco, but more like 12, but being the adventurer I am, I still told her I was down to extend the end of our trip up to Portland, since I had never been. We ended up buying a flight up to Portland, as this was much shorter than enduring the long drive through North California, and got there early on Saturday to spend a full day in the city. We checked into our hotel in the city's center and got brunch at a local diner.

We scheduled a tour mid-day that set to take us to the Columbia River Gorge and Multnomah Falls, roughly 40 minutes out of the city. I highly recommend making these stops if you're ever in the Portland area, as they are both beautiful! The gorge is formed by the Columbia River that cuts through the Cascade mountains, and Crown Point is a perfect viewing area to stop at (which was featured in the movie, Twilight, by the way... I know, ew, Twilight, whatever). This gorge is actually the largest national scenic area in the United States, however, and features a land of natural contrasts between rain forests, desert, sea-level passages and alpine meadows. Multnomah Falls is one of the numerous falls located off of the gorge and is 611 feet tall. According to an old Native America tale, Multnomah Falls was created to win the heart of a young princess who wanted a place to bathe.

On our way back to Portland, we asked our tour guide which breweries were the best in the area. Of course, this wasn't a one-brewery answer, as Portland is well-known for their numerous breweries. We decided on a brewery just outside of the downtown area across the river, called Breakside Brewery. It was perfect, and this brewery alone made me fall in love with the city of Portland. Rhi and I ordered two flights to be able to sample all of their signature brews. We had all sorts of plans to hit up the famous food trucks that were located near our hotel, and to go out and experience the night life, and so on and so forth. But all at once, tiredness overcame us. We had an exhausting few days and could not go on any further, so ended up headed back to our hotel and crashing for the night. On the way, our Uber driver explained to us how Portland is also pretty famous for their strip clubs, which is considered a perfectly normal and socially acceptable form of pass time in the city, for both men and women. We didn't get to partake in the locals way of life, but we learned a lot about the area in our short time here and will definitely be returning in the future. Portland is definitely a chill city, with good vibes.

Part 4: Seattle, Washington

This was another spontaneous addition to our trip, because Rhi, who thought Portland was 3 hours from San Francisco, also decided Seattle was close enough to tag it to the end of our trip as well. I mean she wasn't wrong this time, as it was only an approximate 2.5 hour drive to Seattle from Portland that Sunday morning. I'm honestly quite surprised we didn't end up in Canada. Anyway, we ventured to Seattle bright and early on Sunday to spend a whole day in the city, as our flights didn't leave until 10PM that night. Once we got there, we ran around the city taking as much of it in as we possibly could in 9 hours.

Not going to lie, I am secretly (not so secretly) in love with the city of Seattle. We were pretty fortunate, since it typically rains 300 days a year in this city and our one day there we had perfect weather and sunshine. We first stopped for brunch, because it was Easter, and everyone else was doing it. Then I forced Rhi to venture over to the Space Needle with me, because that's what first-time-Seattle-goers do. She hated me for it, because she's not a fan of heights, but thanked me later. Afterwards, we went to the Chihuly Garden and Glass museum, which was actually really interesting. Who knew glass could be so fun?! Props to you for your talents, Dale Chihuly.

After all of this excitement, we took a stroll through the streets of Seattle past Christian Grey's penthouse apartment, the Escala. Just in case anyone is interested, it's on sale right now for $8.8 million. Then we headed down to Pioneer Square to check out the famous fresh market, gum wall and the world's first Starbucks. All iconic Seattle tourism sights. We also looked up some of the best coffee shops in Seattle, since they're sort of known for that thing, and tried out a local spot before heading to dinner at a basement tavern. It was an event filled day, but it was all we needed to fall in love. Seattle, I will return to you again. Hopefully sooner than later.

All in all, it was an amazing trip with good company and great adventures. It's one I will always remember with my girls. I highly recommend any part of it to others who are interested in planning a getaway with friends!