Day 3

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Day 3: Monday, July 27, 1998. Drive from Paisley, OR to Forks, WA.

We left Paisley and then enjoyed our best scenery so far on the trip as we traveled over the Cascades and toward Portland, OR. The drive gave us some excellent views of the Three Sisters and Mt. Hood. In Portland we picked up Meg and finally all 13 trip members were together. We headed north for Washington's Olympic Coast where we would stay overnight in the Rain Forest Hostel. This was very interesting, to say the least. The most interesting part of the hostel had to be the host, a man who spoke in ways that made people feel just a little suspicious of the whole experience. I'll call him "Hostel Man". My favorite term for the hostel was "Shady Operation", and most of the group had similar feelings.

Some favorite moments from the Hostel:

	"Hostel Man" noticed that we were the UNI Panthers. He then proceeded to go into some half-coherent speech about animals as mascots. "Wouldn't it be neat if you could meet the animal and see what they were really like? Just to see if they represent the school well?…" Freaky.
	"Hostel Man" asked how we found about the Hostel. Karen then went into a long story about how we had been turned down by this church, then this organization, then referred here, then there, and finally we made reservations at the hostel. The guy just had a look on his face like "So we were your last resort? Let's see who gets clean sheets tonight..."
	Packing on the rear deck was quite an adventure. Everybody knew what they needed, they just couldn't convince themselves of that fact. Gear was everywhere. Slowly everybody got over their rookie jitters and packed their packs.
	Hostel Man left for the night and returned the next morning. He had not changed his clothes. Strange.
	Chores! The morning we left the hostel we each had to do a chore. Most of us weeded what was supposed to be a flower garden. Looked more like a weed garden. Some lucky people, like Kristen, got to clean the toilet. Ginger, Rick's other daughter, came in from Seattle that morning, and also was assigned a chore. Just a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Meg, Kristen, a mouse, and the nicest garage-turned-hotel on the west coast.	"I've got to carry what? You've got to be kidding me…"