Seaside Rendezvous

This year the USP’s went to Seaside, Oregon, for our annual vacation. Here are some pictures and a bit of a travelogue.

Our first tourist stop was the maritime museum in Astoria. This smallish museum was easily manageable in about 2 hours, including a 45-minute movie about sharks. We also took a tour of a Coast Guard boat that used to be used as a lighthouse. The mouth of the Columbia River is one of the most dangerous areas to navigate in the world, and there are testimonials to all the ships that have sunk while trying to make the crossing. It was one of those macabre and fascinating exhibits, like those of old railway accidents. Alex climbed up here by himself but needed some assistance getting down.

My socks are intentionally mismatched, from The Socklady.

Here are some more photos from that day. These were all taken by Chris.

This was the lighthouse ship Columbia.

 

Unused, mossy pilings next to the museum.

 

The bridge taking route 101 north. This is a Very Big Bridge. Very high, and 4.1 miles long. It is so high that the nervous Chris refused to allow me to drive on it, for a few days, but by the time we left, he’d overcome this, and we took that bridge to go home. This was taken from the museum parking lot.

 

In between our adventures we spent a lot of time on the beach. Some of you may remember my reports from a Pacific Ocean-side camping trip we took a few years ago, reporting the area to be cold, foggy and deserted. Well, yes. Still happened here. Apparently the fog happens when it is very hot inland, because the water vapor is being drawn in by air currents to cool the land (?). This is what one of the locals told Chris.

There are a lot of poles on the beach, because the city was prepping for a statewide volleyball competition or something. We left the area before this event began. This picture was taken in the evening. Fires are allowed on the beach, and it seems like there is no restriction about being on the beach late at night, or anything like that. It constantly amazed me.

 

Our next day trip was to the town of Tillamook. This had two very diverse venues we wanted to visit: the Cheese Factory and the Air Museum. We started off the day at the Cheese Factory, purchasing some fudge and the Tillamook Cheese Cookbook.

This is a photo from Amazon. Click here to buy the book. It’s mostly all macaroni and cheese recipes.

 

Then we went on to the Air Museum, which would have used up several rolls of film, if Chris still used a film camera.

A B-17.

 

A Catalina.

 

A cheeky child.

 

Thunderbolt.

 

Tomcat.

 

Me and a Nieuport. I think I’m starting to look more and more like Aunt Ann every year.

 

A Mustang.

 

We have a lot more photographs of this place!

 

Afterwards, back to the beach.

The Pacific coast beaches are really not the place to go if you want to get a good tan.

 

The next day we visited…(big surprise)…a yarn store. This was right in Seaside. The owner had a cat, who was very cuddly and sat on Alex’s lap being stroked while I shopped. Purchases were minimal.

 

Thursday, our adventure was to the Oregon Zoo. We’d been here before, when Alex was 5, because the guy who made my big loom lived near Portland, so we’d driven down, made a long weekend of it, purchased the loom and headed back. Alex, of course, remembered none of it, but I was surprised to find out how much I’d forgotten. Chris didn’t even remember being in Portland before!

Cats are the same no matter where they live.

 

See what I mean? Looks just like Bickie.

 

Alex and I fed the lorikeets with cups of “nectar” (which I suspect was just sugar water). Alex remained calm and even assisted some younger children to be brave when they were intimidated by the claws and flapping.

 

This tiger was a little more active than most cats. Too bad he was a little out of focus.

 

Our plan after the zoo was to go into downtown Portland and wander around, seeing whatever sights there were to see (and a stop at the Fluevog store was also planned), but we were all beat from about 5 miles of walking, so we headed for home with a stop at a brewpub for lunch.

 

Later, more beach.

All these beach pics were taken from the balcony of our hotel room. Chris didn’t want to take his camera down on the beach, when we went to play.

Alex made a few friends on the beach, building sandcastles and catching sand crabs. We had a good time despite the fogged-in beach, and despite the fact that our room was 5 flights up and we took the stairs all the time. I’d hoped this would help me as exercise, but I gained a pound while we were away.

The hotel had a pool, which Alex and I visited on a few foggy evenings, but we have no pictures of that.

All in all, we had a great time together, relaxing and forgetting about daily cares. We may go back, but not in the next few years – we’ve got too much else we want to do!