Saturday, May 20, 2006

I got up at 6:00 a.m. so I could wrap up in my blanket and sit on the balcony for the last time. This is such a relaxing place. Tuesday, our first morning here, I wanted to pray for one of my volunteers that was going to have surgery that day. After that, it didn't take any reminders to pray, just you, God, the ocean and daybreak. What a way to start a morning. I went in and showered around 6:30. Becky and Mom got up, had coffee and we all started packing.

We went down for our breakfast and then Becky and I left for our walk. This time we took the time to extend the walk out onto the beach for a long ways.We got back a little after 10:00 a.m. and checked out.

We started driving north on 101 again. Stopped again in Newport at a Farmer's Market. Becky bought strawberries, Mom bought kettle corn. Just north of Newport we stopped at the Yaquina Head Lighthouse. It's under wraps right now because it is being re-done. Good thing we bought postcards of that one.

This is the northern end of a volcano. On the south side of the head all three of us walked down many, many stairs to the shore to check out the tide pools. It was AWESOME! Again we found starfish, purple sea urchins, sea anemone. We had to take care not to step on any mussel beds. They had fantastic volunteers every place we went - very friendly, very informative. We saw lots of everything. On the large rocks we saw harbor seals and babies, commorants, murre birds (like penguins).

Next we stopped at Devils' Punchbowl State Park. So named because the ocean chewed away at this cave until the roof collapsed. It looks like a bowl when it fills up with surf churned water. At low tide you can walk down in it. We had a light lunch at Mo's Restaurant right there. We took the walkway past the Punchbowl to another overlook where we saw a beach full of surfers for the first time.

After awhile we left 101 and drove along the Three Capes Scenic Loop. Beautiful! As we turned onto this highway we realized we would be driving along with some sort of biking event. We soon left them behind and continued back onto 101 at Tillamook, Indian for Land of Many Waters. We stopped at Tillamook Cheese Factory which is huge - Huge factory, Huge headquarters & huge store. We decided not to wait in a long line for an icecream cone or cheese.

Small towns along 101 are quaint and picturesque. I took some pictures as we drove through Wheeler, OR. Finally we drove on a bridge across part of the Columbia River into Astoria, OR around 6:15 p.m. This is where the Lewis & Clark expedition ended and the Columbia dumps into the ocean. Took a picture of a very long, large bridge completely across the Columbia into the State of Washington. Got a room at the Holiday Express on the shore of the Columbia almost right under the big bridge. You couldn't hear any traffic from it because it is so high up.

This Holiday Express was very nice and we lucked out and got a room with a view of the harbor. There were ships coming and going nonstop. We ate at the Cafe Uniontown across the Parking lot from the hotel. Astoria is built into the side of the hill/mountain and you can see all the different layers of buildings. Becky and I went for a walk on the trolley tracks along side of the river. Then she and Mom headed for the hot tub which was the only thing that the Overleaf Lodge didn't have, yet. It's still about 60 deg. More beautiful, relaxing sunsets.