We have also started a new picasa alblum for this trip.
Well, almost 7 months to the day since we arrived home from our 6 month adventure last summer, off we go again. This trip will take us south along the west coast as far as Santa Cruz California.
After spending a few days shining up the wee trailer we departed Courtenay on Tuesday with our target stop for the night being Port Angeles Washington. It was a nice easy drive down the island, arriving in time for a quick lunch at the Bin 4 Burger Lounge before heading over to the ferry terminal. While waiting in line we chatted with a couple from Ontario who have recently become "full timers" having sold their home last year, bought a 25 foot Airstream and traveled a decent part of the US and Canada. They were heading into Washington state to hit I-90 across the country to return to Ontario in time for a granddaughter birth. We chatted about many places we have all seen, some in common and some no so much... lots to see out there.
Finally it came time to get security checked. It was a tad casual considering the recent bombings at the Boston Marathon, just a couple of quick questions and a little tag put under our windshield. The border agent said that the tag was to indicate to the folks in Port Angeles that we have already been checked. We thought that might mean just the immigration part (looking at passports etc) and we'd have to stop at customs on the other side, but no, they just waved us through when we got off the boat in Port Angeles.
Leaving Victoria we had a fabulous view of the harbour and the Empress Hotel...
Since we had just had a nice lunch we didn't need anything on the ferry but checked out the cafeteria for future reference anyway. Not much there, some soup and sandwiches basically, so good to know if we come back this way... have a meal in Port Angeles before catching the ferry!
We stayed at the Elwha Dam RV Park for the night. Nice campground but it seems a bit early in the year. Nobody around and no hot water in the bathroom sinks. We thought we might mention the lack of hot water at the office in the morning however, although the sign indicated they opened at 9:00 am, the office was still closed when we departed at about 9:15... makes one wonder why we were honest enough to pay using the night drop last evening when we arrived... because we are honest... that's why!
After we arrived at the RV park, we checked out the restrooms. In the men's there is an interesting sign posted on the toilet wall...
... hmm, we can only hope they mean "please don't steal the toilet paper!" but it also has a bit of a ring of "reuse and sharing", although there is no evidence of someplace to leave the used toilet paper so others could "also use it"... Nah, that's a bit weird, we have to go with the "no stealing" theory.
Anyway, after setting up the wee trailer at the RV park we drove back into Port Angeles for a look around. Of course we found a yarn store which was still open so had to visit it where Kris picked up some beautiful yarn for a scarf and another set for a cool hat to knit. Afterwards we drove down to the dock area where we had a decent dinner at the Downrigger's waterfront restaurant. On the way back to the RV park we stopped at an Albertson's for some groceries and a Shell for some gas. Back at the wee trailer we started watching our new DVD series Breaking Bad. We usually buy a couple of DVD series for our road trips and this one, after watching the first couple of episodes, is just excellent. We have seasons 1 thru 4 so have lots to watch.
Wednesday we headed west on US 101 around the Olympic Peninsula via the town of Forks, a major setting of "The Twilight Saga". The drive around the peninsula is very pretty particularly in the northern part. As you go further south you see more and more logging trucks and evidence of clear cut logging which, from a tourist perspective is not particularly scenic. Lots of areas where they have signs when an area was clear cut and when it was re-planted so you can see how fast the forest can come back. One area re-planted only 25 years ago has trees of a pretty good size.
Our lunch stop was in Aberdeen at Duffy's on the main drag... and a good choice that was. The large fabulous seafood salads for lunch are going to be hard to beat.
We stopped for the night at the Cape Disappointment State Park. We stayed here a number of years ago in one of their yurts and quite enjoyed it. It is still a lovely park (they do warn very strongly about raccoons) with each site tucked away in trees...
...with a fair amount of privacy, although there was a family with small children a few spots away and the children seemed to enjoy setting off the car alarm the next morning (although not too early). At one time we heard the woman yelling "noooooo...." and as we looked to see what was happening realized she had tried too late to stop her little one from pooing in the middle of the road! Yikes! Lots of cleanup with reams of paper towels and buckets of water on both child and road after that one. Reminds one of the old Beatles tune "Why don't we do it in the road".
That afternoon after dropping off the trailer we drove up to the lighthouse for a view out over the point...
... then into the pleasant little town of Ilwaco to wander around the galleries etc down by the marina. Kris had a good look through a number of galleries while Brian watched and chatted with a fellow carving out wood bowls on his lathe...
Very nice. We checked out the grocery store in Ilwaco and found it not particularly to our liking (a bit grotty if the truth were told) so opted to drive 3 or so miles north to Long Beach where we found an IGA with a good stock of fresh oysters and the necessary fixin's to go with them. Then it was back to the campground to fry up the oysters then get everything cleaned up before the hoards of raccoons descended upon us (we actually never did see any but that doesn't mean they didn't have a good look about after we headed inside for the night). After dinner we set out to do a fire in the fire pit but it turned out the wood we bought at the IGA was a tad wet as we used all our paper and a full packet to firestarter to no avail. The best burning we got was the (soon to be empty) firestarter box and ended up with just some charred wood in the end... so into the trailer to continue watching Breaking Bad and share a bottle of wine. Wine is so much cheaper here. Brands we pay as much as $20 for at home are under $10 here.
On our way south on Thursday we stopped in the historic downtown area of Astoria, Oregon. Our friends, Stephen and Christina had stopped there for a couple of days and told us how much they liked it so we decided that since we have driven right past Astoria a number of times it was about time to check it out. We found a place to park the wee trailer and spent about an hour walking around a few blocks including going into a "old hardware" store where they have nothing we need but everything we wanted. very cool stuff. We opted to leave empty handed. Along the streets in the historic downtown area they have placed neat looking trash cans which all look like canned salmon tins...
Continuing south on US 101 we stopped at Bay City just north of Tillamook for a great lunch on the wharf at the Fish Peddler. Very popular and you can see why. We had a crab/shrimp louie salad and a grilled salmon with salad... both very Yummmmmy! The restaurant is situated alongside (might even be part of) Pacific Seafood and you can go and watch the oysters being processed for sale in the retail department. We bought some oysters to fry up for dinner later.
We ended the day in Lincoln City and checked into the KOA. There are two ways to the KOA around Devil's Lake. Arriving we drove in from the north end. After dropping off the trailer we drove into Lincoln City via the south end of the lake. This part goes through a marshy area where the water was actually over the road. We drove through about a hundred yards of water that was about 4 inches or more deep by going on the opposite side of the road. Made a guy in a large pickup truck wait but hey... if he was in a hurry he could go through on our side which was easily over a foot deep. We decided to use the north end road for the rest of this stay. We went to the factory outlets for a look around and bought a few clothing items then drove around town a bit where we came across a "blow your own" glassblowing place... hmmm best to check this out... and ended up reserving our spots for first thing in the morning before heading out of town. Since it was starting to rain we decided to head over to the local casino for a bit of gambling and some dinner at the buffet. The gambling was a bust, setting us back about $35 but the prime rib buffet for $14.95 each was excellent. Hey, we got a seniors discount! woo hoo!! We returned to the trailer for some more Breaking Bad.
Friday morning we stopped at the glassblowing place where Kris made a heart shaped piece and Brian made a starfish. They won't be ready to pick up until Saturday but the folks there agreed to hold them for us until our way back north in a month. Sweet!
After that we headed off in the rain but it cleared enough to provide the magnificent views along the central Oregon coast. We stopped at Winchester Bay for our usual lunch at Fishpatrick's on the wharf followed up with the purchase of a box of canned tuna and a box of canned salmon from the Sportsmen's Cannery next door. That should keep us in good supply through next winter. We stopped at the Bandon KOA for the night. They gave us our usual spot (B2) which is reasonably secluded but close to the restrooms. Their big white kitty was his normal cuddly self. After setting up the trailer for the night we drove the 10 kms south to Port Orford for a glass of wine at the Redfish overlooking the bay. This is one of the most beautiful spots on the coast. The bartender here agreed when we told him he has the best office view possible...
We had planned a possible two nights at Bandon but it was still drizzly with the outlook of continued drizzle so we decided to just keep going south where the forecast was for more sun and a lot less rain. The fellow at the KOA told us that the weather front moving in would mean rain all the way to San Francisco, but about a half hour after leaving the KOA the clouds cleared and it was a great sunny day through the rest of the Oregon coast and into California. We stopped, for lunch, in Crescent City, at the Chart Room Restaurant on the dock. We got there just at the end of lunch rush so had to wait about 10 minutes for a table but then the place basically cleared out. A nice selection of grilled cod, prawns and scallops was the perfect lunch on this day.
We stopped for the night at the Mad River Rapids RV Resort in the north end of Arcata, California. Nice campground with paved and grassy spots. We were situated in spot 55 near the restrooms (always good for us). We then drove into downtown Arcata. One of the best shoe stores around always seems to elude us by having weird enough hours that we consistently miss them. Today was no exception. We arrived downtown just before 5:00 pm, parked down the street from the shoe store and found that they close at 4:00 pm on Saturday. WHAT THE???... and of course, they are closed on Sunday and Monday so even though we are staying here until Monday morning we will still miss them. Oh well, maybe on our way back north. There were still numerous stores around the central square still open, including the yarn store where another project was born. After that we headed south about 6 miles to Eureka, wandered around the Target store for about half an hour then drove to the historic center where we had another nice seafood dinner (oysters and crab cakes with salads) at the Cafe Waterfront while we watched Tim Lincecum and the Giants beat up on the Padres... YEAH!!!!
Sunday was our first non-travel day of the trip. After a bit of attempting web browsing (good connection but soooo sloooooow), we drove into Eureka for a coffee at Starbucks then a wander around the historic old town, specifically into Talisman Beads where it is hard to come away empty handed. Most stores were closed so later in the morning we drove south to King Salmon Way and one of our favorite restaurants. Gill's on the Bay for a very nice lunch (we both had the sauteed sole). After that it was time to head back to the RV park and do some laundry etc etc.
Although, as we end this first week, we appear to be out of the rain for a while, it is still on the coolish side, not to mention quite windy, here in Arcata (in the 9 C) range. Looking at the forecast for Cloverdale we see it will be in the high 20's low 30's for the next 10 days or so and we are looking forward to a bit of that!
| On to Week 2 |
Glad to see your having a good time.
ReplyDeleteLooks like your headed into summer weather! Don't forget the sunscreen.
We have had a couple of rainy days, but some nice weather incoming at home too.
Kyle Corey