A Couple of New Items

We donated one of our barrel chairs to Good Will. We replaced the chair with a 54 inch tall cat scratch post with two curved shelves. (clickable pics)  The shelves are perfect for one cat to lay or roll around in. Although, Hitch found out he could not get too rambunctious because he suddenly found himself hanging from the top shelf with Squirrel hissing and batting at his hind feet. It has been interesting to watch which one becomes King-of-the-Post. Our cats now have the choice of carpet, wood, or sisal for sharpening their claws. All three have been tested and met with approval. We hope this will replace all desire to scratch up the furniture. Riiiight. Dan secured the post to the floor so it will not tip over while we are on rough roads. Hitch actually laid in it during our last drive. He was lying in the lower shelf so he had a perfect view of the world going by the window. Yep, they’re not spoiled.

Before we left Florence, we took a scenic dune buggy ride. The dune area is about 5 miles long by 1 mile wide. Despite the cold weather, the wind, and the threat of rain, there were many off-road-vehicles (ORVs) enjoying the dunes. It is truly amazing to sit at the top of a dune and look out over all this sand. The dunes are very beautiful even on a bad day. We drove through creeks, along the beach, and through the woods.

The ride became a little more exciting when our driver took us down several steep dunes that felt like we were going straight down. At one point, the same company’s smaller/faster dune rider came zipping down a dune straight at us, cut to the right, and covered us in sand! Thanks, we needed that! He proceeded to go sideways along the same steep dune we had just come down. Those guys were having a blast!

We also thought we were both deaf in one ear afterwards. The young lady sitting directly behind us has a very good set of lungs and every animal within a 1-mile radius heard her screams. Wow! She was laughing too, so at least she was having fun. It was a lot of fun and we would suggest it to anyone visiting Florence to go for a ride. Next time, Dan wants to ride the faster dune buggy.

We stayed in Eugene at a very nice county park for a week.  Armitage Park is a nice change from being in heavily wooded campgrounds. It has wide open grassy lawns with tall trees. The lots are so large that you barely notice a neighbor moving in next door. The best part is the asphalt spaces. It is so nice to walk outside and not have to worry about getting mud all over our shoes. There are paved pathways everywhere. One goes down to the river and under a few bridges. The weather has been great with a lot more sunshine with a little bit of rain.

While in Eugene we had LineX sprayed on the lower front portion of our Bluebird, and color matched.  This freshens up the look of the front end greatly, and should resist sand and gravel better as we travel.  LineX is a very tough coating used on pickup truck beds, and high impact areas of other vehicles.  http://www.linex.com/  .  In the picture, it is raining a little and we have not put our license plate nor Bluebird BMC emblem back on yet.   

Subject to change, we think we will head south on I-5 a bit to the Sutherlin Oregon Escapees park, then head back over to the Oregon coast at Bandon.  From there we will likely head south into Northern CA to check out the Redwood forests.

Central Oregon Coast

We are in Florence Oregon for about 10 days at the South Jetty Thousand Trails park. It feels like we are camping in a rain forest. The campground is thickly wooded and covered in moss giving us the feeling of being secluded. A very nice place to go for walks. We saw a lot more rain this week. This has been the wettest and coldest June for Oregon in a long time. It is supposed to start warming up soon. We can only keep our fingers crossed. Well, not while we are typing.

Hitch and Dusty have been begging to go out for a walk since we got here. Dusty is our quiet one, but when he makes up his mind that he wants to go out, he can be very insistent and loud. He gets on the table and in YOUR face attitude! “I want out, NOW Mister!” The weather cleared for a while and we took both cats outside. Dusty immediately started tugging on the leash while making mewing sounds. He was searching for grass which is hard to find in a moss covered forest. Dan finally took Dusty to a vacant space with more sun exposure and plenty of grass to graze. Dusty is a happy cat once again. In the meantime, Hitch explored every nook and cranny he could find. He climbed trees, went over huge fallen trees, and through bushes. Sandy had fun trying to keep up with Hitch’s challenge course through the woods.

We are two miles away from the beach, but we haven’t spent much time there. The beaches are covered in sand dunes. Many of the vacationers bring their dune buggies and ATVs to ride across the dunes. So far, we have only seen the sun a couple of times. On the days we did have sunshine or partly cloudy, we traveled north and south along the coast.

We stopped by the Darlingtonia State Park just outside of Florence. We wanted to see the carnivorous Cobra Lily and they were blooming so we got some pictures. The plants are bigger than we thought they would be.

Our favorite drive was going north and turning around at Cape Perpetua. The drive up was very scenic with lots of views of cliffs and ocean. Unfortunately, the lifeforms in the tide pools in that area are mostly gone. No starfish. No sea urchins. We visited quite a few lighthouses along the way. We did not go inside most of them. We did a little hiking here and there. We drove to the Outlook at Cape Perpetua and walked along one of the trails. Beautiful views if you don’t mind heights.

Our trip south was pretty uneventful. We stopped to see the Umpqua Lighthouse located right on the Coast Guard base. Civilians are still allowed to visit the lighthouse. We had lunch on Bandon’s harbor and drove through Ballard State Park before returning home.

Next stop: Eugene Oregon for some work on the lower front cap of the motor home.  We will be putting a color matching high end tough pickup truck bed coating on the lower front to deflect road debris  http://www.linex.com/  .

Newport, Oregon

We have been spending most of our time in the local area. It has rained almost every day since we got here, but it hasn’t kept us from enjoying the sights, food, and the beaches. We have also been spending some time just hanging out in our campground. Whalers Rest is a very nice campground. It is heavily wooded with trails and just a walk across the highway from the beach.

It’s a good thing we are only staying in this area for three weeks. Every time we order food it is a very generous amount. Whether it was breakfast burritos from Super Oscar’s Mexican Food in Newport or a scoop of ice cream on Lincoln City’s waterfront, they were big enough for two people and very tasty.

It is advised to travel southbound if you want to make frequent stops along the coast as all the scenery and all the pull offs are on the ocean side.   So, we drove to Lincoln City and turned around to head back south to view the scenery. In one section, we drove the Otter Crest Loop instead of staying on Hwy 101. The Loop is a one-way starting from the north end. The drive is very scenic with tree covered winding roads giving us glimpses of the cliffs and the ocean. There were quite a few pullover areas and we took advantage of stopping to take in the views. We stopped at Cape Foulweather’s Look-Out Observatory and Gift Shop. We could not believe this building was built in 1937 on the edge of a 500 foot cliff! Talk about a view! Wow! It is absolutely breathtaking! As usual the pictures in our Webshots album do not give the view the justice it deserves, but we try.

We visited both lighthouses in the area: Yaquina Bay Lighthouse and Yaquina Head Lighthouse. The Yaquina Bay Lighthouse is the only wooden lighthouse and was decommissioned after 3 years because the Yaquina Head Lighthouse was so close that it was confusing the ships. The local Historic Societies renovated and refurnished the old lighthouse after saving it from demolition. They did a wonderful job of bringing the old place back to life. After our self-tour, it was hard to believe this place had been neglected for almost a 100 years.

At the Yaquina Head Lighthouse, we were able to go all the way to the Lantern room in the 93ft tower. We spent a couple of hours exploring the tidepools during low tide and watching the Harbor Seals. Yep, more pictures of the tidepools are in our Oregon album on webshots.

Sandy found the Yaquina Bay Bridge very interesting the first time we crossed it. The unusual Art Deco design on the bridge looked very old yet the bridge looked strong and in good condition. She decided to look it up online and found out it was built in 1936. It was the last of six bridges to be designed by Conde B. McCullough to link Oregon’s coastal highway. We came across two more bridges built by McCullough. One is on the Otter Crest Loop and the other is in Walport. Of course, Sandy had to take pictures of the bridges’ Art Deco. You can see the Bridges in Webshots. Sandy also started mumbling something about not having the right color scheme for an Art Deco quilt while digging through her stash    ..….uh-oh…

Family Business, Repairs and Cats

Since we left Westport, we laid Sandy's mom's ashes to rest in the national cemetery in Kent Washington with her husband's ashes.  We then traveled to La Conner and Oak Harbor Washington to prepare Sandy's mom's home in an over 55 mobile home park for sale, sorting, distributing, and donating all personal effects.   The home is now on the market, and Sandy's brother Jay is monitoring the progress.

On the cat front, all the pills and special diet foods are finally gone. Dan became quite an expert on how to pill the cats. Half the time, the cats did not know what had happened until it was over. The cats have been permanently switched over to canned meat with just a little dry food to keep them happy. Two have actually lost a little weight. During the medication, Squirrel was pulling out clumps of his fur. We think he may have had a reaction and was getting a hot spot. It is growing back and he is looking a lot better. Dusty is acting like a kitten again. He sounds like a miniature elephant running up and down the rig making strange mewing sounds. With all this renewed kitten-like energy, we have to wonder how long he was feeling bad. We are happy they are all feeling better even with all the additional activity going on between four very healthy cats.

The cats were not the only ones getting our attention this past month. Our motor home did not like sitting for seven months in a moist salt air environment. By the time we left La Conner, our motor home had a list of needed repairs. Dan did some of the repairs in campgrounds and on the road, and we used 4 service facilities as well.  We now have a working propane furnace, increased engine power with potentially higher fuel economy, a updated and more powerful engine exhaust brake, all exterior lights working correctly, and all new heavy duty Michelin 16 ply tires.  With all safety and comfort items back in order, we are now traveling for pleasure once again.  As we write this, we are in Newport Oregon on the coast, and will soon post on our experiences here.