In Portland we got to visit more friends from Sweden, the Lanns. At this point, about halfway into the trip, we were ready for a break. A sort of vacation from our vacation. Jonas and Greta were so generous as to be our home base for a little travel reboot.
We stayed 3 nights (2 full days). The original plan had been to do the “reboot day” on the first day and then “do” Portland on the second day. But at the end of the first day, we felt like we could really use a little more reboot time, and we couldn’t think of a single thing that we were just dying to do in Portland. So we hung around the house again for a second day.
It wasn’t glamorous or exciting, but one thing we’ve learned about traveling for this long is that you just can’t do glamorous and exciting everyday for three months. Our bodies wouldn’t hold up, our minds and hearts wouldn’t be able to process it all, and our budget wouldn’t survive.
Our kids got along great with their kids, and they had a great fenced-in yard where they could all play together. While they did that, we took the chance to clean out and vacuum the car and the camper, resort, reorganize and restock our supplies, catch up on laundry, and all the little things that we often don’t have time or energy for in the midst of our travels. We even washed the car seat covers – not that they stayed clean for very long. Staffan and I each had an afternoon to run errands that we needed to run – by ourselves. While we feel incredibly blessed to have so much time together as a family, alone time is not so easy to come by and yet still necessary for everybody’s well-being. For me that was a trip to Target, Trader Joe’s and Starbucks, plus time spent driving there and listening to something other than Veggie Tales. Sometimes it’s all about the little things.
The girls playing with a bubble machine!
We slept well, we were fed well, the weather was great, and there was time and space for things like exercise and watching the season premier of Grey’s Anatomy. We are so thankful to the Lann family for fitting us in to their busy work-school-homework-soccer-practice-dentist-appointment week. Sometimes, even in the midst of an amazing trip like the one we’re on, a little bit of normal is exactly what you need. We left feeling refreshed and ready to take on new adventures, like those that awaited us in Crater Lake!