Mr. & Mrs. Vandebilt + kids

I truthfully can’t believe we managed this long. It really was bound to happen after months on the road. It seems we aren’t immune though, and the flu finally found us.

Nora was our patient zero. She made a nice little splash in the kitchen and has ended our days of Kraft Dinner for lunch. The spirals are much better on the way down. The next day Jacob fought the bug for a solid day while the rest of us enjoyed a lazy rainy day in our borrowed cottage.

Finally on our last night, Madeline was taken out and by the time moving morning rolled around I was down for the count. There is really no way to describe just how horrible it is to have to pack up all your belongings, clean an airbnb and face a 4 hour drive along the hilly twisty coastline while you are constantly looking for a bucket. We managed to get everything in the car, not well, but done and set off. We made it 45 minutes before we had to pull over. Madeline was barely conscious and I was just miserable.

There was no way we were making the rest of the drive to Forks. So we found the nearest hotel in Astoria (where they filmed the Goonies, Kindergarten Cop, some of Twilight, etc) and quarantined ourselves in the room. We eventually forced fed Madeline some gravol (after she finally understood that it was not actually rocks) and I thanked my lucky stars for the prescription Zofran from the birthday deleting flu of 2023.

After a day of rest and a good nights sleep (thankfully the sea lions were on the other side of the hotel) we packed up again and finished the drive to Forks.