Weekend Adventures

[thatbaldwinlife]

This will be an ongoing thread about our weekend adventures in the Westy. We have always been pretty outdoorsy but since getting the Westy, we cannot find ourselves staying at home on the weekends. We tried to do one new thing or go to one new place every weekend in the summer. We use #saturdayadventure or #sundayadventure on our Instagram pages. This will mostly be random pics of the van or places we have gone.
I will do a dump to start it and most are downloads from Instagram as I lost the originals somehow. In the future, I will try and update after the trip from the original photo.
My Instagram account is nate_baldwin
Here it goes:
Hiking in Forest Park and playing Hunger Games:

Rainy day exploring the backroads near Banks, Or.

Beach trip while mom was vacationing in Malibu

Vista House in the Gorge

Learning how to skip rocks at Rooster Rock State Park

Backroad from Spruce Run campground to the coast

Up by Lake Merwin, Wa

Yamhill County exploring

Abandoned houses can be scary

Berry picking on Sauvie Island

Coast trip

Wine tasting in Dundee

Another coast trip

with a return trip on the ferry

Camping in Mt. Hood

And last weekends alpaca and farm tour near Molalla

Well that catches us up and I hope to keep this going with our adventures!
nate

[Sodo]

Them'r some cute girls. Mine are bigger and I push down on their heads to get them to stop growing. They know what I'm trying to do and resist mightily. One grew an inch in the last 2 months. Remember these times, there can be better times ahead but Westy roadtrips with young kids can be among the best. Mine are almost too big for the van (not quite).

Really nice pics, thanks for posting. Gotta get my van running for a Fall trip.
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'90 Westy EJ25, 2Peloquins, 3knobs, pressure-oiled GT mainshaft, filtered, cooled gearbox
'87 Tintop w 47k 53k, '12 SmallCar EJ25, cooled filtered gearbox
....KTMs, GasGas, SPOT mtb

[thatbaldwinlife]

Yeah we have two older girls (14 and 17) that go with us sometimes. Depends on if they think it will be fun

Twins are at a great age for adventures.

nate

[flomulgator]

I apologize for drifting somewhat from the spirit of your thread, but as a skier that is the most horrifying picture of Mt. Hood I have ever seen.
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She's built like a steakhouse, but she handles like a bistro!

[Inlet]

I really like the beach picture right above the ferry one...

[erikj2000]

Inspiring, pics. Really dig posts like this. Keep it up, they grow up fast.

[jimf909]

GREAT pics. Thanks for sharing your summer adventures. Time to plan for Fall and Winter fun.

[Thebeas]

I wish we had country like that to explore around here in Mississippi.
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1983 2WD 1.9 Digijet

[thatbaldwinlife]

Thanks for the feedback guys! Looking back I cannot believe we fit all that and more into a spring/summer. We also had a 6 day Westy road trip to Cali in there! I also had two moto trips over the summer. Wow.

I am trying to teach my girls that there is much more to life then screen time. Go explore the world. Have fun. Get hurt. Learn.

Yes the mountain snow is non existent. Maybe we will have a strong snow pack this year? Somehow I doubt it.

nate

[newfisher]

[thatbaldwinlife]

Been a while since I have posted to this thread. Been doing other things besides adventures! My wife took the Westy camping with some friends while I put a clutch and main seal in her 67 Bug. Well we got out today for a quick Gorge adventure.
Went out Wash. 14 for some exploring.
Stopped at the Steigerwald Lake National Wildlife Refuge for a quick hike

My 14 year old and I

Stopped at Cape Horn Lookout

Beacon Rock State Park for a bathroom break

Went into Stevenson for lunch then onto Bingen for the antique shop and to walk off our lunch.
Took Washougal River Rd on the way back

Hope you enjoyed our Saturday Adventure!

[dhaavers]

Sweet rig & beautiful pics. Thanks for posting!


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86 White Wolfsburg Westy Weekender
"The WonderVan"
<EDITED TO PROTECT INNOCENT PIXELS>

[erikj2000]

Great pics. Good story. Keep it up.

[AKWesty]

[vanagonjr]

[thatbaldwinlife]

Looked to be a very rainy November day here in PDX so we packed up the three younger kiddos and took off for the Tillamook Forestry Center off of Hwy 6. The oldest had homework to do so she stayed home.
First stop was to show my wife where I took the kids camping over the summer down by the Wilson River. To much rain to go exploring on foot here.

Next stop, the Forestry Center. They have a super cool lookout tower you can climb up and pretend to live in and spot fires.

Westy is a ways down there!

The center is free but they ask for donations for the visit. Inside, there is a lot for the kids (and adults) to play with, dress up, read, watch videos and generally learn about the Tillamook Burn:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tillamook_Burn and logging history.

Out back is a giant bridge that crosses the Wilson River and has easy hiking trails to explore. A break in the rain allowed us time to explore.

A quick stop in the gift shop for chocolate slugs (unfortunately, not real ) and we headed back towards the house. We are not ones to take the fastest way home so we went towards Timber and cut off on Strassel rd to Hwy 26.

Glad I got the mudflaps recently as the van stayed much cleaner than past rainy days. Still dirty, but better.

From there it was home and to wash the Westy off before going back into the garage waiting for the next weekend adventure.

nate

[newfisher]

Good times! We took advantage of the rainy weekend to, but explored the souther part of the State.

[thatbaldwinlife]

It's been awhile since we had a Westy adventure here! November is usually busy with kid birthdays and holidays so we were pretty wrapped up. I took the week off of work and it finally stopped raining yesterday for a bit so we did a quick trip north up to the old Grist Mill outside of Woodland.
http://www.cedarcreekgristmill.com/

The mill was built in 1876 to grind flour for local farmers. It was closed today but it is still in operation and you can buy flour from them.

Took the long way back to I5 and stopped by the boat launch so the girls could through stuff in the river.

Then it was time to head south before the commuters got onto the highway. Short but fun trip.

nate

[thatbaldwinlife]

Finally had a few clear days here in Portland after a record rainfall of nearly 16" in December! We decided to head south to Silver Falls to do some hiking. We had not been there since the twins were young and in strollers so this hiking would be a bit easier.
Pretty relaxing drive on the backroads had us at the park by 12:30 or so. The trails down to the falls and south falls were covered in ice in a lot of places. It made for tricky hiking down but did keep a lot of people off the trail.
View from the top

On the way down

Heading to the south falls

The south falls. The trail was open behind the falls. Very wet and cold but we had a blast going behind it in the frozen wonderland.

Hiked back to the top, about a 4 mile round trip. Good hike but we needed some food. Back to the Westy to head for town. Stopped on the way out for some views of the valley.

Into Salem for coffee and dinner. Then jumped on I5 for a quick trip home as we had some tired kids. Another great Westy Adventure day!
nate

[thatbaldwinlife]

After two weekends spent replacing the entire front end with Powerflex bushings and Moog ball joints, my wife and I decided it was time for just us to get out and do some exploring and boondock camping.
We loaded up and took off Saturday morning towards Wilsonville to check out Cars and Coffee to hope to see Tristar Eric's race van. We only stuck around for 30 min or so but did not see him. New Tesla X was there though. We headed to Camping World to pick a up an led camplight and hit the road.
We took the backroads towards Newberg and then towards Carlton

Had to find a side road to make some lunch. Saw this on the way

After a quick sandwich and coffee, we hit the road west. Was looking for Bible Creek Rd to take back south but took the wrong one. It ended up going the same direction but much higher and we went through some nice snow.
A few trees to move

My wife and I after running into the only other vehicle we saw, a Sheriff checking on wood cutting permits

Back over to Hwy 22 then west. After a quick stop to get a few supplies, we headed back north into the woods to find a spot to camp. Of course we found lot's of great sites earlier but now we struggled to find something out of the way. Settled on this side of the road spot and did not see another soul all night.

Up at 2500 feet, it started snowing on us and we got in the van, made some dinner and turned up the Mr. Buddy heater. A few glasses of wine and we were out.

Next morning was clear and beautiful.

Headed down towards the coast and did some exploring. Ended up in Tillamook and then had to get home to get some 5th grade homework projects done with the kids.

Until next time!