Abby and her mother Tina, along with 8 Twilight Moms (and one daughter) had an AMAZING time in Forks, Washington, Vancouver, BC and Seattle, WA! The dream trip started off with a 5 hour flight to Seattle where we picked up a 12-person van and a mini-van to tote all the luggage 11 women must carry for a 5 day trek! The weather was amazingly cool – low 60’s most days and rainy – perfect Vampire weather for the vamp fans among our group. Our first stop was in Port Angeles, WA where we ate at Bella Italia – the place Bella and Edward had their first date in the book series! We then headed on to Forks and checked into our hotel – Pacific Inn! Karen who works their also works at the City Hall and she arranged for Abby and our crew to meet the Police Chief and the Mayor of Forks the next day!! That was incredibly awesome!! We started our tour of Forks with Team Forks Tours – with Randy and Debbie – (located near Leppell’s Florist and Gift Shop). Randy made sure we saw all the big spots in Forks (the town Stephanie Meyer based her Twilight series) – the Forks High School, The Cullen House, Jacob’s House, First Beach/LaPush, the Chamber of Commerce, the City Hall/Police Station, etc. We then hit all the gift shops – which Forks is the MECCA for Twilight Merchandise!!! Dazzled by Twilight – big thanks Ashlyn and Ali – they donated items for us to use at upcoming events and made us cry with their love and generosity!!!, Alice’s Closet – Staci helped get a look-a-like Jacob and Alice to join us on our tour and gave us discounts on some awesome autographed items to help our upcoming fundraising events – so awesome!!. Other great shopping places – Native Twilight, Forks Outfitters, Leppell’s Florist and Gifts – so many more – and they all were so wonderful to all of us and made sure Abby had an amazing time! We finished the day off with Bella Burgers at Sully’s Burgers! The owner of the Pacific Inn heard about Abby and moved her and her mother to one of the Twilight rooms that came available that day!! How sweet!!!
Our next day had us traveling to Port Townsend to catch a ferry to Coupeville and then a 3 hour trek to Vancouver, BC (and a not very nice Canadian Custom’s Officer – don’t think he understood the draw of Twilight and what these crazy women were doing!!). We checked into The Sutton Place hotel where they graciously upgraded their room to a suite so they got to stay in style in Vancouver! We ate a delicious meal across the street from the hotel and then went shopping a bit taking in all the madness of the Stanley Cup crowd there were in Vancouver for the games! (We think some of the players were at our hotel too!!!) On Friday, June 3rd we met up with Christine with On Location Tours who took us around for 8 hours to many of the filming sites of the three movies – New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn! By far – everyone’s favorite was a toss-up between Jacob’s House and the woods were several scenes were shot. We finished the day with an amazing dinner at Blue Water Cafe in the room that the cast had their wrap party after filming New Moon!! Very exciting and delicious food!!
On Saturday, June 4th we started making our trek back towards Seattle and arrived just before dinner at our hotel – The Paramount located near Pikes Market which has wonderful shopping all around! After dinner at P.F. Changs it was off to the Space Needle. It was a very breezy night in Seattle and the top of the Needle actually swayed in the breeze – very weird feeling and a major accomplishment for Abby (and Twilight Mom Kristie) to even venture out onto the observation deck!
On Sunday, June 5th – we made it to the airport (after a slight scenic route to find a gas station before turning in the rental vans) and to the gate just in time to get a video from another Twilight Mom of the new Breaking Dawn trailer! We all viewed it quickly while grabbing a burger and jumping on the plane to head home. Abby and Tina where able to get an upgrade and fly First Class on the way home which was a first for Abby!
Abby got to recuperate for a week and then had to go in for her scheduled chemo treatment. Our hope is that her memories from the trip will help her through the upcoming tough days of chemo and that she will be able to “escape” to the magical Twilight world when things get rough.
So many people helped to get Abby to Forks and Vancouver and it would not have been possible without all of you very special people giving and donating to help fund her way! Big thanks also to the Twilight Moms who donated their items for the Yard Sale that helped kick off our fundraising efforts. The employees of Lamar Advertising were so instrumental in raising the other needed funds to get Abby to Forks! You made this trip possible!
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Abby's Dream 