THE OREGON COAST

Aug. 6, 2014, we arrive at Devils Lake Rv Park in Lincoln City, Oregon.  This park is across the street from a large beautiful lake.  The park itself is nice, but was up on a hill, so all sites even though they were large, were impossible to level.  We just walked crooked for 3 nights.  The first day we go to "klikos" for lunch, overlooking the beach and tide pools.  The food was o.k. but the view was better.  Before we went our car would not start, so a workamper jumped us with his golfcart.  We went out and bought a new battery.  Well, next day, same problem, jumped again and joel took the car to a specialty car repair shop.  After a few hours of troubleshooting, it is found that the electrical component that moves our electric seats was malfunctioning and was draining our battery.  Part was on back order so Joel disconnected it, memory seat still worked.  We took some nice scenic rides, the weather was low 60's and cold and damp.  We met Pete and Donna who we know from our winter home in Ca.  We were so surprised.  They were visiting family in Portland, and they recognized our car.  How do you like that?  Then we wintered 2 years ago  in Fort Pierce Fl and friends we met there, and we follow each other on facebook, well, they were in Tillamook an hour up the coast.  We each drive a half hour and meet in Pacific City and had a great dinner together.  All was not lost. 

Well, it is Aug. 9th and we are at Woahink Lake Rv resort in Florence, Oregon.  We have huge sand dunes behind us and a lake across the street.  Weather cold and damp.  One of the folks in the park takes Joel atv'ing in the dunes, made his week.  I do 2 loads of laundry and fight rotten weather, and an upset stomach.  We leave on the 15th, but our rig won't start.  Our battery minder not working, so the owner is nice enough to jump us from his truck.  After about a half hour we are on our way.

Aug. 15th, we pull into Nesika rv park , gold beach, Oregon, right near the ocean, colder and damper.  Oh, great, now it is drizzling.  It was the only place I could find with a pull thru to fit us.  Unfortunately, hard to make turns in this park.  Giant hedge scratches our trailer on the way in.  Then when we were leaving, had to move all the way to one side to avoid tree boughs.  Oh no, now we have huge gash in trailer from hitting the electrical receptacle box.  I am feeling worse with my stomach.

On Aug. 18th, we pull in Mad River Rapids Rv Park in Arcata, Ca.  We have long pull thru but with shrubs on one side.  Hook ups so far back we have to use 30 feet of sewer hose and an extra piece of cable wire.  We are only staying 2 nights.  We visit town of Ferndale, and drive around taking photos of beautiful Victorian buildings, weather still cold and damp, we stop at Loleta Cheese Factory, very small to watch cheese being made.  Can hardly wait to get to Sparks, Nevada, our next stop.

 

All these pics are the pacific ocean

at the Oregon coast, gorgeous rock formations

 

 

This is called the devils churn

 

 

 

Pictures of Victorian homes in Ferndale

 

 

 

Below pics of gardens in cheese factory gardens

 

 

 

These are our friends, Bob and Camille McCullough

 

CASCADE LOCKS, OREGON

It is Aug. 5th and we are here at Cascade Locks Koa in Oregon.  We are only staying 2 nights so we have to accomplish a lot.  We got in before 2pm and set up and then went to see some gorgeous waterfalls about 20 minutes away.  I hope you like the pic.  I took a video but you will have to turn it sideways to watch.  It seems when you hold any camera vertically to take a video it will flip it 90 degrees.  Anyhoo, then we went to the fish hatchery where they raise trout and sturgeon.  We saw a 12 foot sturgeon named Herman and he is about 50 years old.  Had a nice dinner and relaxed the rest of the evening.

Well, today we have made arrangements to go zip lining in Stevenson, Washington which is right across from where we are over the Bridge of the Gods over the Columbia River.  It only took us about 20 minutes to get there and we were in a beautiful lodge.  We had lunch before we went on our tour and we both had the special which was corkscrew pasta with fresh marinara sauce with chicken breast and parmesan cheese.  We had some homemade bread with it and it was very filling.

Well, now to the zip line tour.  We got all geared up and had to take a long hike into the forest.  We climbed up hills to get to the first zip line platform.  This is really cool.  All in all we will take 8 zip lines across the forest, starting with very short to very long.  We also had to cross 3 suspension bridges to get to the platform and that was the hairiest part for me.  The first 2 were short and easy.  Then we had to rappel down to the ground to get to the furthest one.  This is not something for the faint of heart to do.  The rappelling was the favorite part for me.  I took a few pics and some video of me coming in to the last platform.  Enjoy.  Some is of us and others of the group we were with, a family of four.  We had a great time.  It took about 2 hours and the weather has cooled down a lot and was delightful.  Walking to one of the platforms we passed some blackberry bushes and had a snack.

All in all a wonderful day.  One more thing crossed off the bucket list.  Tomorrow we go to Lincoln City, Oregon on the coast, oh we will be having crabs and clams all week.  Yum, yum.

Waterfall above and Joel below

cooling his feet in the pool of the waterfall

 

 

 

 

Herman the Sturgeon

 

 

Beautiful rainbow trout

 

 

All geared up and ready to go

 

 

 

 

Joel is first up

 

 

Joel rapelling down

 

 

 

 

He looks tough

 

 

This is me, wheeeee

 

 

 

Below is video of waterfall in case one above didn't work

 

 

PENDLETON, OREGON

It is July 30th and we just checked into the Koa in Pendleton, Oregon for 5 nights.  It is a large koa and we have a long pull thru open to the sky for our satellite dish.  We are close to town and Pendleton is one of the original western towns.  It was really the wild wild west. 

It is the 31st and we go into town for a tour of the underground.  Chinese workers came to Oregon during the gold rush days and they lived in underground rooms doing the laundry and such.  They were not treated well and were lied to.  They were told that if they lived there and did all the work they would earn enough money to bring their families to Oregon, which was a lie because not only didn't they make enough money, but were treated really badly and addicted to Opium which kept them docile.  When the town had no more use for them they were put in the mines and then the mines were blown up.  Horrible way to die and these workers did so much, ran all the laundries. 

We also toured a brothel which was in use up to 1953.  It was really nice, but you had to walk up a flight of stairs which had 32 steps, I don't know how the drunken miners made it up.  I was like a large hotel, with sitting rooms, all original.  It was so interesting to see this.  It was a nice tour.

The next day we went to a museum and saw how Pendleton became a large town.  We walked through a caboose of an old train and went into an old cabin.  It was a nice museum and the day we went it was free.  One day a month is a free day and we happened to be there on this day.  We had a nice lunch in town , pulled pork and taco salad and yesterday we went to a Chinese restaurant and they gave us far too much food.  Today we are hanging out at the rig, it is about 90 degrees out and we will go to Safeway later to stock up on groceries.  Tomorrow we will go to the Koa in Cascade Locks, Oregon. 

 

These underground rooms had bars, some were speakeasies

during the time of prohibition and had secret doors and rooms

to hide in during raids

 

 

 

 

 

Pics below of the laundry area

 

 

 

Huge meat market below

 

 

 

Gambling parlors

 

 

 

Both of these pics are of the recreation areas below

 

 

 

Below the brothel sitting room

 

 

Old Chevrolet fire engine outside the museum

 

 

 

Caboose we toured at the Umatilla Museum

 

 

Old barn

 

 

Above is the cabin with double story living quarters