Back to the Cascades - Oct. 19 - 22

It was a beautiful drive from Newport, OR east through the Willamette Valley with wineries, farms and quaint towns with a night in Foster, OR at a county park, River Bend CG. This was a really pristine CG with very nice facilities. Always attracted by water, we chose a non-hookup site by the river.

Next stop Sisters, a western town with lots of shops and several antique stores for Harry with nightfall at Tumalo SP in Bend. The sign coming in said No Vacancy which based on past experience didn't make sense. We along with another camper went in anyway and spoke to the host. She didn't have a clue what was open. The campground was about half empty! There was no escaping the road noise at this park and no dumping facilities. My fault for not reading the guide but we were headed for dispersed camping so we quickly swung by La Pine SP south of Bend. Too quick as it turned out. A truck was passing as we left but hung along side. The New Englander in me couldn't figure out what I had done to bring on the road rage until I realized he was trying to tell us something was wrong! Looking back, I didn't see the bikes. We had forgotten to put the rack back up after filling the tanks! Oops! Back to Bend we went to get a new tire for Harry’s bike after quite a drag along the pavement!

A fellow camper in Tumalo tipped us off about Newberry National Volcanic Monument and the CGs. This is a 1,200 sq. mile area about the size of RI. Parts of park were closed as were the campgrounds but they had called the National Forest Agency who told them what CGs could still be accessed (never thought of doing this). Paulina Lake, a crater lake at 6331 ft. was one such spot. There are several CGs but the campers again told us of the one, Little Crater Lake that had the best sun to quickly warm us after a 20 degree night. With 49 sites strung out along the lake, we were one of two the first night and the only one the second. This night Harry woke me at 2:30 to say he heard footsteps in the gravel and then quickly fell back to sleep. Dreaming for sure but I spent the rest of the night on guard. #46 was the best for early/late sun and the best view. It didn’t get below 30 degrees and the days were 70 plus with not a cloud in the sky. My kind of weather! Biking, hiking and hanging out.

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More of the North Coast of Oregon - Oct. 17 - 18

Sliding into the River Bend County Park in Foster, OR Saturday night after a busy day, I had planned an easy beans and dog meal but was reminded this would be a bad mix with the chill we had at lunch! A quick switch to the last of the smoked salmon from Will over baked potatoes and spinach salad w/apples and goat cheese turned out a wonderful meal that was so easy. Will have to remember this one for the book.

The past couple days were spent with more poking along the coast down to Newport in search of beach agates, a visit to the Oregon Coast Aquarium (5 stars!) and a first ever overnight at a casino, the Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City. We realized this wasn't a novel idea as soon as we pulled into the designated parking lot with about 70-100 other assorted RV’s and campers. It turned out to be the start of the 16^th Annual Western BCA Regional 9-Ball Championship (pool players association) that ran through the weekend! It actually quieted down to a good night. The casino looks out over the Pacific, has easy access to the beach and is free. We'd stop again! 

The aquarium was phenomenal with exhibits of fish, birds, mammals and sea life in their habitat. The Seabird Aviary was the best with much of what I could hope to see on the rocks off shore but couldn't get to - Tufted and Horned Puffins, Rhinoceros Auklets, Pigeon Guillemots, Common Murres and Black Oystercatchers. There was also an exhibit called Passages of the Deep where you walk through a glass tunnel with fish and sharks swimming all around including over and under!

For variety, we are looping east over the Cascades to Sisters, Bend and if the weather holds as promised, we may make a pass through Crater Lake. The NP campgrounds are closed for the season as are many of the National Forest areas so we’ll see how it goes but hope to come back to the southern part of the Oregon coast before getting to CA.

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Cape Lookout SP - Tillamook, OR - Oct. 15 - 16

At this point, Nina thinks life is a beach and our new home. She could be right!

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Nehalem Bay State Park - Oct. 14

Leaving Spruce Run CG, we decided to travel down the Nehalem River on Foss Road instead of backtracking to Rte 26. This was a 30 mile trip half of which was a snaky, gravel road with significant potholes. It was still worth the drive although I wasn't the one driving.

After checking out availability at Nehalem Bay State Park, we headed back north to Cannon Beach and Haystack Rock to see what was happening at low tide. This is home to Tufted Puffins from April through August but there was also suppose to be colorful starfish and anemones. We weren't disappointed and enjoyed a few surprises.

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Along the Columbia River Gorge and Mt. Hood – Oct. 10 – 13

This stretch was a lot of poking along the Columbia River Scenic Byway by waterfalls, scenic vistas and small towns of Troutdale, Cascade Locks and Hood River. The Bonneville Dam operated by the Army Corp. was closed of course but the fish hatchery was open. There were two bronze sculpture artists, Rip Caswell in Troutdale and Heather Soderberg in Cascade Locks who had statues displayed throughout the towns. Their works were so impressive that we visited the studios of both. Heather has her own foundry with her husband and they walked us through the whole process with pictures and pieces of the statue of Sacagawea that you will see in my photos. Nina was also particularly taken by her work! The first night we stayed at the Ainsworth State Park CG which wasn’t the greatest but adequate.

Continuing our drive up and around Mt. Hood, we traveled through vineyards, orchards and a fun stop at a lavender farm. We intended to try our luck at dispersed camping in the National Forest assuming their campgrounds would be closed but were pleasantly surprised to find no gates or “closed” signs at two of the campgrounds so in we went to Nottingham CG. We were the only ones there (spooky) but it was a great site by a creek with wood to burn.

This was to be a scenic drive to see Mt. Hood but except for a small peak we never did! The weather was supposed to clear on Saturday but morning brought 41 degrees and rain. We took the drive up to the Timberline Lodge anyway and rain turned to snow. Next time! Back towards the coast we go and found a really nice county park, Spruce Run County Park CG in Seaside along the Nehalem River. We enjoyed it so much, we stayed an extra day.

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Cathlamet, WA - Elochoman Slough Marina CG, - Oct. 9

This was a quick overnight stop at a pretty funky county park/marina, Elochoman Marina. The getting there was fun and full of surprises because we didn’t realize the green line we were following on the GPS back over the Columbia to WA was partly by small ferry until we rounded a corner and found ourselves immediately in line to board. The ferry took us to Puget Island and then a bridge across from there. We met a guy on the ferry who relocated to the island after years of fishing in Alaska. He chose the island for the quaintness and the “Little Norway” feel. The island is in WA where there is no income tax but he shops and does his business in OR where everything is cheaper and no sales tax. Makes sense to me!

The marina abutted the town sewer treatment facility that was in the process of being relocated but still being used. All this really meant for us was a couple pools that didn’t have any odor and attracted a great collection of ducks! The town of Cathlamet was small, quaint and worth a walk about.

What was really fun for Harry was the small fishing fleet that fished out in front of us with drift nets and brought their catch in at the end of the day to be weighed and sold to a distributor. I don’t know that I’d recommend this spot for all our friends but we enjoyed it. Fish for Harry, birds for me!

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Ft. Stevens SP, Hammond, OR - Oct. 7 - 8

Crossing the river to Astoria, the first stop was to the Columbia River Maritime Museum. This is a must see museum with incredible exhibits on fishing, canning, the river and bar pilots, wartime, mapping and on and on. The forces of the water at the mouth of the river demand great respect and knowledge of the ebb and flow of the river colliding with the tide and winds of the ocean on the shallow waters of the sand bar. The wrecks are many and the big ships take on bar pilots to get them in and out of the mouth and then a river pilot for the rest of their journey up the Columbia. It was amazing to learn that potatoes can travel over 400 miles from Idaho down the Snake and Columbia Rivers.

We’d listen to The Shipping Report on one of the local public radio stations which would list what boats were coming in that day, from where and what they were bringing in or picking up. The ships were mostly coming from China, Japan and Korea and were picking up logs and lots of wheat as it was harvest time. They also aired advisories for checking weather conditions on the bar and great maritime stories.

Ft. Stevens SP was on the OR side. The two parks were quite different but each good in their own way. The campground here was much bigger and buried in the woods but there was over 9 miles of great biking trails connecting the CG with the beach, lake and historical areas. We were able to get one of the few tent sites (8 +/-) which was nicer and less expensive. Most of the other sites at Ft. Stevens were full hookups which we didn't need or want. The sites at Cape Disappointment were very close to the beach, had a variety of full hookup to primitive and less dense but what there was for bike paths didn't connect the park and the roads were too narrow, twisty and dropped off with no shoulder to comfortably ride. 

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Cape Disappointment - Oct. 4 - 6

After we had made online reservations for Deception Pass SP, we were a little gun shy of WA SPs not because we were hit with an online reservation fee which is the norm but we were also hit with an out of state deposit. This collectively added $12 to a one night stay. We really wanted to stay at Cape Disappointment in WA on the mouth of the Columbia River so figured we’d give it another try and were pleasantly surprised to find no out of state surcharge arriving w/out a reservation – something to keep in mind.

Cape Disappointment was where Lewis & Clark finally arrived at the Pacific Ocean although they made their winter camp on the south side in OR. We again were pleasantly surprised to find the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Ctr. open. Because the center was cooperatively shared between the government, WA and OR, it wasn’t affected by the shutdown. 

The campground right by the beach was bustling with the opening of razor clam season and a favorable minus low tide. We watched how they dug for them using a 6” PVC tube about 3-4’ long w/a handle and air hole at the end. The sand traps in the tube and takes 2 tube fills to get the clam. You can easily see where the clams are by either a dimple or bulge about the size of a 50 cent piece in the wet sand. A 3 day license can be had for $8, 15 clam/day limit. We worked it through and thought for a short while that we would dig but then reality set in on how to store the whole clams, clean them (there was a nice cleaning station nearby but the tide was late) and then process or cook them in volume in our 19’ van.

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Last Stop thru Indianola - Oct. 2 - 3

This visit is best described as “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”! The Good was visiting again with Sue and Will, Drew and Lori and Sue’s neighbors and friends, Becky and Gale for a fabulous dinner followed the next day by touring through Indianola and Suquamish.

The Bad was arriving back at Sue’s to find out that Danny, her dog, had a bad laceration from jumping a fence. Sue and I headed off to the vet for 4+ hours while they sedated him to clean and stitch his leg. Interestingly, the only vet that could help at short notice was a VCA 24 hour urgent care facility that we also have and use on the east coast. Harry in the meantime “played” with an excavator moving a log around and drove with Will in his Triumph down to a local marina.

And the Ugly! Next to Sue & Will’s property is a pasture with cows. Harry warned us to take our time coming back from the vet because it turned out this was the day the cows (4) were to be butchered – onsite at the foot of their driveway! I know our local farm, Weir River, has a “meet the meat day” and this is life but to do this on the road in public with a spot light as it was dark was too much. Harry told me enough to get a “visual” but I’m so glad I wasn’t there!

Pushing all that aside, we had one more feast before we left – Dungeness crab cakes, fresh salmon and oysters. Sue sent us off with fresh eggs and Liberty apples picked from her trees and almost forgot, smoked salmon from Will. Sad goodbyes but we will be back.

On the way through Poulsbo, we made a stop at Central Market. This is a five store family chain grocery store in WA that is much like Whole Foods but better with lots of local produce. We were able to completely reprovision and picked up some local Chanterelle mushrooms, the same that we had seen growing on Rich’s property.

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Matlock, WA - Sept. 29 - Oct. 1

The trouble with getting into a good book, “Ahab’s Wife”, is that the blog writing gets put aside day after day after day! 

It was still raining Sunday going into the Quinault Rain Forest. The only campground open, Willaby CG, was pretty nice with lots of space as we were the only ones there. 

I had defrosted a pork loin several days back when we camped next to the NW Dutch Oven Group so had to cook it up regardless of the weather.  The awning went up to ease the pain of cold rain which was our undoing! We won’t discuss the “would have, should have, could haves” but long story short the awning collapsed against the van about the same time Harry was headed out to take it down. Unfortunately the middle brace and lateral arms gave way and punched through the awning. It was toast but there was also the problem of putting the awning away (or cutting it off) so that we could move. My cousin, Rich, was coming to meet us the next day so we asked him to bring tools and a hack saw as a last ditch effort. 

The morning brought light and new clarity to our situation and Harry was able to relieve tension so that we could crank the awning in. I wish the same had been true with our government! The shutdown has brought into perspective what is a real problem and what is an inconvenience best dealt with once we get home. Of course the shutdown has closed all National Parks, National Forest, BLM and Army Corp. campgrounds which was one of the main focuses of our trip and where we prefer to stay!

Rich led us back to his home in Matlock via Donkey Creek Road. This was a short cut through mostly National Forest and private logging roads. He cleared the way of fallen trees and warned us of low clearance areas but one 2 mile stretch was an education. It was a single lane logging road that was so busy that we waited for a logging truck going in our direction to run interference for us. Who would know!

We had a great time catching up, seeing his home and property. We poked along the Hood Canal and after trying unsuccessfully to find Geoduck (gooey duck) served in a restaurant, we picked one up at Taylor Shellfish and headed home to try our own hand at cooking. Harry watched a few YouTube videos and then we had lots of laughs cooking everything up – Geoduck, oysters and meatloaf.

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