Week 3 Troutdale to Arcata California

Our general travel route for this week...

Sunday was another fabulous weather day in the Portland area. We decided it was a good day to visit the Hawthorne district so off we went with coffee in hand. First stop was Rejuvenation Hardware. This used to be such a cool place where the emphasis was on salvage recovered from old building demolitions and you could spend ages looking through it. Now, although there is still some old salvage stuff they appear to have, for the most part, gone a bit upscale and much more expensive especially in the lighting department. Not much for us to look at on this day. So then off to Happy Knits knitting store then to the main shopping area along Hawthorne around 30th Ave or so. We visited the local Powell's Bookstore then stopped in at the Bagdad pub for lunch. Very good as usual. After more wandering around we stopped at Starbucks for a couple of iced lattes and sat outside just watching the pedestrian traffic go by. We decided to go off to another neighbourhood along Alberta Street but after driving along several, well many, blocks on Alberta Street we concluded that we had the residential area rather than the retail area and since it was getting late in the afternoon just gave it up. Somewhere along Alberta Street the retail outlets are safe from us! We stopped at Trader Joe's for some supplies then headed back to the trailer to veg out for the evening. We finished off the poached Coho from Saturday along with a watermelon salad for dinner.

Monday was day trip day. Our main target for the day was the Maryhill Museum of Art in Maryhill Washington about an hour and a half east of Troutdale via I-84 to Hood River then WA-14 the rest of the way. Along the way we stopped in at Foothills Yarn & Fiber about 15 minutes south of Hood River not far off OR-35 On the way we had a great view of Mount Hood...

The valley south of Hood River is one of those great micro climates that is just perfect for apple and pear orchards. Beautiful area supplying, among other things, 12% of all Bartlett Pears in the USA. The pear trees are absolutely chock-a-block full of fruit not yet quite ready to pick yet. The yarn store is actually at a small farm where they also raise alpacas. Neat place to visit. They had a couple of young alpacas that were only a few days old. Very cute...

... more alpaca pics on our picasa album. The folks there recommended the 6th Street Bistro, in Hood River, as a good lunch place so we decided to give it a try and were not disappointed with our lunches of soup and salads. After lunch we headed across the river and onto WA-14 heading east towards Maryhill. Unfortunately, unknown to us was the extensive road resurfacing currently underway. Numerous sections of the highway were subject to one way traffic only resulting in a much longer drive than planned. We didn't get to the museum until nearly 4:00 pm and it closes at 5:00 pm so we ended up being a bit rushed. Oh well, we still had enough time for the one key permanent exhibit, which was on Kris' bucket list, The Theatre de la Mode. What an awesome exhibit!  This exhibit consists of 1/3 scale mannequins, each dressed by a couturier.  The exhibit was created in 1945 in Paris.  There was no money or materials for the couturier houses to have collections in the year right after the war but there was a desire to keep the skills of the artists who create the garments and accessories alive.  The entire collection is created with the same detail and skill as the full scale garments, shoes, handbags, hats.  The collection was sent on tour through Europe and then America to promote the products of the French fashion industry.  By the time the collection got to San Francisco the fashion industry was back in business and the interest in the mannequins petered out and there was no money to send it 'home'.  The collection went into storage and eventually a benefactor of the Maryhill Museum arranged to buy the collection and send it to the museum.  There are hundreds of mannequins and they are put on rotating display, so if you go every few years you might eventually see the entire collection.  Some of the mannequins have gone to Paris for exhibition;  I imagine the Petit Palais or some other Parisian museum would love to have it back permanently; it is a totally unique example of couturier fashion of the mid-century.

The views up and down the Columbia River valley were not too shabby either...

... more pics of the exhibit, the views from the museum terrace and the museum gardens are on our picasa album. For the drive back we elected to drive further west on WA-14 to the next river crossing (about 10 kms) and just take I-84 back to Troutdale. Tons of folks wind and kite surfing along the gorge but no good spots to stop and take pics of them.

Since Apple was to make their big announcement about the iphone 6 sometime Tuesday morning, we decided to just head back to the south end of Portland, stay overnight at a different RV park then see if we could pick up an iphone 5s at a discounted price after the announcement. So Tuesday morning we packed up and off we went. We drove south from Troutdale through Damascus where a fellow is known for building "tiny houses" on trailer frames and we wanted to have a look and chat with him. We found the place where he hangs out but he wasn't around. There was only one tiny house there and it was locked but we were able to have a look and peek in the windows. Cute. Anyway, we stopped for the night at the Roamer's Rest RV Park (another one with no picnic tables) in Tualatin, a south end bedroom community to Portland. After unloading the wee trailer we drove over to the Bridgeport Village Mall for another California Pizza Kitchen lunch then walked over to the Apple store. So the announcement was made, yada yada, and the iphone 6 will be available, in store, on the 19th and there will likely be a $100 price reduction on the iphone 5s but that discount will not be available until the 19th, Crap... oh well, we don't need the phone right away so will make a return trip up to Portland on the way back home. We could get one when we are in San Francisco later in the month but by waiting until we get back to Portland we avoid the sales tax and, hey, a return trip up to Portland is no great sweat anyway!

Wednesday we headed back to the coast. A full week had gone by and it was time to get back to where we were last week. We drove from Tualatin out to Lincoln City then south to Waldport where we stayed at the KOA for the night. We had a beautiful spot overlooking the bay...

... but, unfortunately, it was waaaay to windy to fire up the grill for the pork chops we bought for dinner. Instead we decided to drive down the hill into Waldport where we went into the Flounder Inn tavern, the only place on the main drag, for some wine and dinner. WARNING... do not go to this place. The food was AWFUL.  PLAIN AND SIMPLE! The only positive about the place was that the waitress put a ball game on the TV for us. Later we remembered that Yachats, a little town with numerous excellent eateries, is a mere 12 kms away. DRAT!

Thursday we continued south, past Florence where we had diverted back up to Portland last week, to Bandon where we stayed at the KOA for a couple of nights. This is still one of our favorite KOAs but it is not that great for folks with long rigs or a lot of slide outs where it appears many sites are too narrow for those big rigs. Perfect for our wee trailer though!  Turns out this weekend is a KOA special BOGO for KOA card members. Our timing is off by one night though so no bonus for us as you need to stay Friday to get Saturday free and we had plans further south for Saturday night. That night after checking in we drove into Port Orford for some wine and munchies (turned out to be more than enough for dinner) at Redfish, where spectacular views just never get old...

On this night we were fortunate to see a whale spouting a ways out off shore.

Friday we drove into Bandon. On the way into town we spotted a street sign for the Bandon Beach Loop Road which we thought we should try to see if it comes out closer to town. WOW... what a find. The long sandy beaches are broken only by fabulous outcroppings of huge rocks sticking out of the ocean....

... more pics along this section of the shoreline are on our picasa album for this trip. We stopped at Coquille Point for a while for some painting and sketching. Fabulous! It turned out that the beach loop road took us right into the old town area (where we wanted to go anyway). Unbeknownst to us, Friday afternoon was the start of the annual Cranberry Festival and much setting up etc along with a large number of tourists made for a very busy setting.  We wandered around the farmer's and artist's market then along the esplanade for excellent seafood combination (fish, prawns, oysters) lunches at the Bandon Bait & Tackle shop. I know, it doesn't sound right but they have a little take away seafood bar and some nice shaded seating outside. After lunch we wandered around the old town taking in neat places like Washed Ashore where they are constantly constructing large artwork out of stuff washed ashore. An excellent awareness campaign! Later, after grabbing a couple of iced lattes we drove south back to Port Orford for some painting and sketching before catching one last relaxing glass of wine on the patio at Redfish then heading back to the KOA to grill up those pork chops we bought a few days ago. Great day and nice evening outside at the campground.

Saturday we continued south into California. On the way through Brookings in Oregon we stopped at Fred Meyer and bought some deli fixings for lunch which we ate when we stopped at the harbor in Crescent City and watched a number of folks trying their best to catch a decent wave to surf but it was just a bit too calm on this day. Our destination for the day was Arcata where we got a spot at the Mad River Rapids RV Park. After a drive into Arcata for a walk around the town center we bought some salmon to poach for dinner and headed back to the RV park where it was still early enough to hit their outdoor pool for our first swim of this trip. However, shortly thereafter the fog started to roll in and the temperature dropped significantly. It was a nice but very cool evening to end this week.

---

Back to Week 2

On to Week 4

---