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Trails, Travels, and Trailering Adventures, Drumore, PA (2026)

02/13/2026

Puerto Rico Minimoon 2026
Feb 11

We arrived in PR around 1am and grabbed our rental car. Original plan was to grab some sleep in the rental til morning and then power through but the 70 degree temps were going to make it difficult to sleep safely and comfortably so I found us a shockingly nice hotel at a good price about 40 mins from the airport that got us in around 3am.

After checking out of our last minute hotel stay, we got on the road to head west to our airbnb. Once we got near the coast, we pulled off to check out a beach and found magic! This spot had to be one of my top 5 most amazing things I've seen. The power of the waves crashing on the rocks was awe inspiring and scary.

We continued our trip along the coast, stumbling upon a statue that looked straight out of hell (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_of_the_New_World) and a tragic accident that had one of our planned pit stops closed for body recovery (https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1FLRqcx677/)

Once we got checked into our Aguadilla airbnb, we realized that while ocean front (ish), we weren't beach front so we loaded back into the rental for a 4 min drive to an actual beach. By this point, it was about 4pm so we didn't stay too long but it was cool seeing the huge pelicans and laying out in the still warm sun.

12/29/2025

Last weekend's and today's wintry hikes

10/09/2025

ONP trip
Sept 30
Last day
We checked out of our gorgeous airbnb and dropped off my dress at a nonprofit thrift store on the way out of Forks and proceeded to head the rest of the way around the park on our way to the airport

Our flight was late that night so we had time for a few stops and some hikes. We headed to Sol Duc Falls and on the way, stopped at a couple of pull offs to look for salmon. We didn't manage to catch any jumping but we did spot some in the water and even saw the tail of one that was swimming upstream over some pretty large rocks. It's crazy the size of the rocks they're able to scale without even coming out of the water really at all

Then we proceeded on to our hike to see a waterfall, which was a short but really pretty hike

On our drive back toward Seattle, we also stopped at Lake crescent, Port Angeles, Dungeness Wildlife refuge, and saw a gorgeous rainbow after a stint of dreary weather

10/06/2025

Day 2
Sept 28
ONP

Day 2 was beach day so we got out to our first beach, Rialto Beach by 10am, which was the only low tide during daylight hours that day. We did a hike recommended by our airbnb hosts, but weren't super optimistic that it would be worth it, since the 10am low tide was still relatively high.

The beaches were not the beautiful beaches of warmer destinations but had really cool and strange seaweed and kelp on the shore and pretty rocks to pick through.

At one point, we nearly turned back, convinced that the rest of the hike was going to be more of the same, but stuck with it and were glad we did. At the end of the hike, we were able to climb up over a rock outcropping to get to a bunch of tide pools containing sea anemones and a great view of the "hole in the wall" rock structure. Jeremiah amassed another large collection of found objects and i found a rainbow of rocks to bring back.

The hike back we were going against the wind and it started drizzling, so it was a grueling cold hike back through rocks and sand. We nixed our other planned beaches and hit our airbnb hot tub instead.

10/03/2025

Day 1 ONP
Sept 27
Our early flight out of Canada allowed us to get over to Olympic before noon so we were able to do some exploring of the Quinault rainforest and Lake Quinault before heading the additional 90 mins to our airbnb in fork. We got in a few very short hikes, and took a drive around the lake using the Guidealong app for info.

Whether the PNW just isn't as staggeringly different from the midatlantic, or just simply isn't as staggering as the Canadian Rockies, we weren't nearly as wowwed by our day 1 as we were by our days spent up in Canada. That said, it's nice to be moving at a slightly slower pace for our last couple of days of this adventure and we still have a number of things to see before we depart. And our airbnb is simply gorgeous

10/03/2025

Day 4 Banff Elopement
Sept 26
Last day in banff

For our last day, we traveled up to the Yoho National Park area to see some final and quick stops before returning our bear spray in lake louise, our park pass in canmore, and heading back to the yyc marriott for our very early morning flight next day.

On our way we stopped at a lookout point, Lower Spiral Tunnel and learned about and saw a train making it's way around the mountains. Then on to Emerald Lake, another beautiful lake in the area that is a bit more teal than some of the other waters we saw. We did a very short hike here and saw a huge woodpecker.
Then we drove over to Natural Bridge and explored the banks a bit. Jeremiah nearly gave me a heart attack standing on the edge of the natural bridge. I also got to see the glacial flour or mountain dust that causes all the waterways in the area to be such an unreal color.

On our way to our last stop, we pulled over at two more lookout points to see the river, one of which was the confluence of two large rivers in the area and then headed on to Takkakaw Falls.

An easy last day in Banff. I can't wait to go back

09/28/2025

Day 3 Banff Elopement
Sept 25
We had a few hours to kill before our shuttle reservations in the afternoon. After grabbing coffee from the same spot, we drove into Banff to take a scenic walk along the bow river to the bow falls lookout. Jeremiah was interested in learning about the internment during ww1 so we stopped first at the cave and basin national historic site. This was the site of the hot springs that led to the development in banff and good lord they were stinky.

After a bit of exploration, we proceeded on to the river. The bow river is bright blue and so pretty. We easily could have done our elopement here instead.

Next we headed over to Johnston Canyon. We only had about 35 or so mins to check things out before we needed to get up to lake louise for our shuttle reservation so we did a short hike to the lower falls and back.

Then on to morraine Lake via the shuttle. Wow. This is one of the most famous lakes in the area and it did not disappoint. So incredibly blue and bright and surrounded by mountains on all sides.

We took a hike up to larch valley to see these unique pines that actually turn yellow in the fall before losing all their needles. The hike was straight up nearly the entire time but so so worth it. We didn't have time to complete the full route since we also wanted to fit in Lake louise before the shuttles stopped running for the day, but we made it up far enough to really appreciate the beautiful yellow trees. Then back down the mountain for a short hike up the Rockpile to get a great overlook view of the lake.
By this point, we were pretty tired, so we hopped on the connector shuttle to get a view of Lake louise. Also very pretty but also very cold thanks to the glacial winds coming down the mountain. We'll do the hikes of Lake louise on our next trip.

09/27/2025

Banff Elopement sept 24
Day 2

After some much needed rest, and coffee and snacks from the coffee shop in our condo building, we got on the road headed north for a trip up the icefield parkway. We took pics at a pretty pulloff in castle mountain by the bow river and then stopped briefly in the town of Lake louise for some pizza and bear spray and got back on the road.

Our first official stop was Herbert Lake which, while not the bright blue of peyto, was beautifully reflective

Next was mistaya Canyon with a somewhat brief hike and exploring

We then hit a harder longer hike up to Parker Ridge. The views on the way up were amazing but the top was incredibly windy and cold and a bit anticlimactic after the beautiful views working our way up. We found some pretty strange and cool rocks on our way back down, including fossils from when the mountain was at the bottom of the sea

Last stop on our adventure was Athabasca Glacier. By this point, my phone was nearly dead and cell service was completely non existent so we were really winging it. We found the toe of the Glacier Trailhead fairly easily but we're pretty bummed when we did the fairly short hike from the parking lot and we're still far away from the actual Glacier. We were about to give up and look into a tour to get out to the Glacier when we noticed a sign a bit different than the rest we had seen along the barriers. This one instead of stating not to cross, said cross at your own risk. That was all we needed to encourage us to take the narrow trail leading past the barrier.

A bit treacherous and questionable, we made it to the Glacier with enough time time to take some pics and touch the ice before hustling back before we lost daylight

09/25/2025

Day 1 Banff Elopement Trip
Sept 23rd

A late arrival flight the night before left me rather sleep deprived when I woke up still on eastern time zone, but it left me plenty of time for wedding preparations before we grabbed breakfast in the lounge and our rental vehicle

Picked up the photographer in banff and drove to peyto Lake where i put on my dress in the backseat and j finished up his attire

We made a short but steep hike to our private location, past the main lookout area where we exchanged our vows and rings and took some photos. Before heading back to banff, we also stopped at Bow Lake to get some pics at lake level.

After dropping the photographer back off, we grabbed sandwiches for the ride and drove over to the Kananaskis nordic spa for a few hours of relaxation and a couples massage. An amazing experience. Capped our wedding night off with McDonald's as it was after 10 by the time we got back into town and we were exhausted after a very long and eventful day on minimal sleep.

Eloping in Banff was the perfect encapsulation of our life and relationship

09/08/2025

Evening hike

06/19/2025

Costa Rica June 16 & 17 (days 7 and 8)
Rather than waste our last full day attempting to have a beach day and getting rained out, we decided to drive inland for an activity that would be less impacted by rain.

We drove about an hour and a half to La Leona waterfall. Getting to this waterfall requires a paid tour, you're not allowed access without a guide due to safety.

It was a great adventure and a good hike, multiple creek crossings, through a cave, rock scrambles and then using a rope to pull against the current into the cavern with the waterfall. The rain started about a 3rd of the way into the hike and was a torrential downpour for the full hike back. But to some degree, it added to the adventure.

Seems that it was finally mostly sunny on the coast so we were able to catch a decent sunset at the beach once back in town.

The next morning, we packed up and got on the road. Didn't want to risk missing our evening flight, given some of the delays we encountered on our drives on the front end of our trip. The drive back was really pretty so we got a final taste of Costa rican beauty before returning our rental and flying out

06/19/2025

Costa rica days 5 & 6

We had a rainy weekend with multiple beach attempts getting nixed due to rainy/cool/cloudy weather. Combining the days bc I can't quite remember which days we we did what

I believe we started the day by checking out playa Flamingo, another popular pretty beach in the area but it was rainy and cool so we ended up going back to brasilito to beach comb for a bit. It stayed cold and rainy and so we went back to our airbnb to wait out the continual rain

After a bit we decided to try to find a hiking spot up in the mountains, seeking clouds like those we got engaged in earlier this year. Google did a lot of lying to us about the existence of public roads to get to some lookout points and supposed trailheads, but eventually we found some access up a mountain via a private gated community. After basically hiking straight up a dirt road, we were gifted with some pretty amazing views. And of course, while up there, the sun came out and it got pretty hot

We hiked back down the mountain via a real trail, lending the feeling of truly being in the Costa Rica wilderness. When we reached the car, we were sweating like crazy so we made the 30 min drive to the beach to get a bit of swimming in.

We ended up at a pretty but stinky beach with now again cloudy skies so we didn't hang long

The next day that we went back to playa Flamingo but it was a bit stinky with a major road running just behind us, so we ditched it when a major storm system rolled in about an hour after our arrival. We toyed with the idea of heading north to try to escape the rain but odds didn't look promising.

At some point we ended up at another beach, playa penca. It was really pretty and although still drizzling, it was warmer than the day before so we set up shop at the end of the beach near rocky outcroppings and pretty trees.

The trees were some sort of fruit tree with these tiny apple looking things that i had seen a hermit crab eating. Figured it was some sort of crabapple tree so I broke the skin of one with my finger and licked it. It was sweet so we set about trying to figure out what it was.

Long story short, some Google searching led us to the conclusion that it was a manchineel tree, also known as the poison Guava tree, claimed to be the deadliest tree in the world. More frantic searches led to some reddit posts from people who interacted more fully with the fruit than I had, who experienced varying degrees of discomfort but no catastrophic effects, so we eventually concluded I'd be ok and didn't need a hospital. By then my mouth was tingling/burning a slight bit so we decided to get away from the poison tree and head back to the airbnb in case symptoms worsened.

I ended up being completely fine, the feeling in my mouth never got worse and went away after about an hour. Very glad I didn't eat any of the fruit and will definitely think twice in the future before tasting unknown plants

Trails, Travels, and Trailering Adventures

02/13/2026

12/29/2025

10/09/2025

10/06/2025

10/03/2025

10/03/2025

09/28/2025

09/27/2025

09/25/2025

09/08/2025

06/19/2025

06/19/2025

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