May | 2019 | Temporary Sanity ...

Today is May 19th and we’ve been gone from home since Thursday May 9th. Tomorrow I will officially be 3/4 of a century old. Some folks may think I passed that lofty goal long ago simply because of my frail appearance but that’s deceptive. Only my legs and arms are frail. The rest of me is quite robust and beefy, almost because I always eat what I order, or dish up for myself at home, even if I don’t want to. This contributes a great deal to the beefy reference.

Our first stop on this adventure was Wheeler, Oregon where we stayed for three days. Upon arrival I found a likely spot to disconnect Diane’s vehicle from the RV. When I disconnected the flat four connector for lights i discovered that one of the male pins was missing when I apparently turned too sharp and pulled it loose from the RV and dragged it all the way from St. Helens to Scappoose where the propane guy pointed it out to me when we stopped to fill our tank. I didn’t notice the missing pin when I plugged it all back in so we didn’t have a right turn signal showing on the tow vehicle, which really wasn’t a problem because the RV lights are higher than the car.

I didn’t, however, notice the missing safety cables until I went to disconnect them, also. I blame Jeff for not noticing they were missing before we left because he helped me put the RV and car together before leaving home. Yes, it’s surely his fault. I never forget things like that when left to my own devices. Well, maybe I don’t forget most of the time is more accurate.

Considering the necessity for getting replacement parts I deemed it good fortune that we were at Nehalem Bay, a mere 36 nautical miles from the nearest Costco and O’Reilly’s one of which was bound to have the parts I needed. We went the next day and confirmed that belief then had lunch at Norma’s in Seaside. Normally it’s a good place for a good crab Louie, but that wasn’t the case this trip. It was pretty, but not as tasty as I would have liked.

The second day we visited Rockaway Beach which is just a wee bit south of Garibaldi where we visited with a nice lady in the Chamber of Commerce caboose next to the public parking lot. Yes, it’s really a caboose and you can’t miss it. Didn’t get her name but that’s OK. She was very informative and helpful reporting that the Kite Festival they normally have this time of year was cancelled by the city. But, there was one hardy fellow that had numerous huge kites in the back of his Tahoe and was busy anchoring them on the beach and getting them into the air.

When we first walked down to the water only two were flying and we walked under them.

On the way back to the parking lot he’d anchored a third kite but the breeze had dwindled to the point where the originally aloft kits were down and the third was just kind of rolling around on the sand. Still, it was quite magnificent. The owner said it was called a Bol. I don’t know what that means and I’m not going to look it up. This thing is easily 25 feet in diameter.

After having our fill of kites, we continued south to Tillamook where we indulged in lunch at the Cheese Factory. Amazingly, the parking lot was far from full even though the weather was pretty nice and a good time to eat
Tillamook ice cream outside. Even so, we chose to partake inside with the other riff raff. We both had Tillamook Cheeseburgers with one order of fries. I think I read somewhere that the beef used to make these hamburgers from retired dairy cows from which they obtained tons of milk to make unknown quantities of cheese over the years. Some may find that a hard fact to deal with, if it were true, but I don’t think it is. Actually, I just made that up but, really, who knows where hamburger comes from.

We arrived at Beverly Beach State Park, the second stop on our trip, on Sunday May 12th. It was a grueling 4 hour drive which I had to do all alone because Diane has yet to drive the RV. One of these days she will, and she’ll do a great job, I know. Just not yet …

On Monday we drove down to Newport and visited old town by the fishing boats. While there we bought a pound of Dungeness crab for a mere $40. That way we could make our own crab Louie’s that tasted really good, which we did, twice. I’m happy to report, so far, that over indulging in crab has not caused my gout to rear its ugly head. I’m always prepared for that but don’t worry about it because I figure the crab is worth the terrible pain and the need to limp for a few days. I have a cane for just that reason.

On the way back to Beverly it started to rain and we returned to a semi-flooded camp site.

On Wednesday, May 15th we did the longest leg of our trip south to Harris Beach State Park in Brookings which is anywhere from 1/8 to 1/2 an inch from the California border depending on which map you look at. Either way, it’s close, and made it possible for us to revisit the Trees of Mystery down that direction. Perhaps you’ve been there and might recognize these guys …

One of the main reasons we made this section of the trip, in addition to seeing such magnificent forests, was to purchase another giant sequoia to plant at home. We had one from our trip two years ago and it was growing well until we killed it. Now we have a replacement and it was good to see all those incredible giant trees. It’s a very humbling thing.

On the trip back to Harris Beach, we stopped in Crescent City for lunch at The Apple Peddler where we stopped with Lydia and Ceiarra two years ago. They welcomed us back with open arms and tried to give us the same booth we had then but we refused and sat in the booth just inside the front door. Perhaps Lydia and C remember this stop. One thing is different there since we visited … they apparently have a machine that cooks chicken like colonel Sanders. Unfortunately, the day we visited, it was broken. They said so.

Had it been working we could have purchased a 100 piece bucket of chicken for about $96. I was so bummed.

After eating we wandered around town and found signs that led us to the water front and a lighthouse that’s been there for many, many years. So, we visited it and Diane convinced her knees that it would be OK to climb all the way to the top, up narrow winding stairs and a short vertical ladder. She did it, enjoyed it and didn’t come down with any debilitating injury because of it. That made me very happy.

Then we went back to Harris Beach to just hang out. It rained most of the time until today, which was beautiful so we went to Harris Beach to watch the water. It was very entertaining.

After that, we took a tour around Brookings to see what’s here. Diane said she did some research and discovered that according to some obscure survey, Harbor, Oregon is the best place to retire to in the state. Harbor, in case you don’t know, is separated from Brookings by the Chetco River. Interesting. We drove out into the wilderness on either side of that river to see what was there and kinda liked both sides.

To end the day, Diane lounged in our private yard at the campground …