Hey everyone, since my honey did such a great job with the first part of our recent Oregon Coast adventure, I thought I'd give the second half a go. The Oregon Coast includes too many towns to count, ranging from working class harbor towns to glitzy Hampton's-style getaways. We saw them all, with Mandi navigating the entire way! Here are some more sights.
The trip resumed just north of Newport Beach (a famous but actually disappointing spot) at a quaint little place called Depoe Bay. It claims to be the smallest navigable harbor in the world and is the most famous spot for whale watching on the coast. Well, we had a great whale watching "ecoexcursion" scheduled with a whale scientist at the helm on a tiny zodiac, but it got postponed by weather twice and we had to move on. Other than the water spray from the baby whale from our last post, this statue was the closest we got to a whale. Too bad for my honey, while the jet boats and dune buggies were my thing this was probably her main event for our trip. Don't worry, though, we're going back to try it again next week...fingers crossed!
The town is tiny but very quaint, with tons of shops crammed into about 2 city blocks right next to the harbor.
Mandi with a friendly Sea Hag along the way! Not implying anything, I promise!
A great shot of the harbor at Depoe Bay, my honey is super with her hip photo function on her phone. I think I would probably hit 5 boats trying to navigate the harbor, it is literally no larger than a Best Buy...
As our journey progressed, we went through another cute town called Coos Bay, one of our favorites. It had a very safe, old-timey down town area that we walked at night, highlighted by the historic Egyptian Theatre that was very cool.
As mentioned in Mandi's entry, she loves lighthouses, well, that's as close as we got to this one...fine by me. I guess they are pretty and impressive but seeing one or two is enough in my book!
Now this was impressive. We got to tour another lighthouse on up the coast and crawl inside the lens. It is apparently made of over 100 pieces of crystal hand-crafted in France and shipped intact over to America and then around the tip of South American to the Oregon coast around 1910. No Panama Canal then so not too shabby. I wonder why they didn't ship it in pieces but didn't get to ask that on the tour. The pieces are all still crystal clear, the color comes from colored plates on the outside that can be changed to change the color of light that emits and effectively change the signal from the lighthouse. We learned that when they were all working the Coast Guard devised a system where each lighthouse had a distinctive signature so that ships could calculate their location by triangulating with the lights...not bad for 1930's folks.
The obligatory self-portrait, I'm getting better at it all the time.
While I was getting somewhat bored on another upper coast beach with lots of wind and too cold of water to walk in, Mandi wandered off and climbed this rock/cliff that went out over the water. At first I was worried but then I climbed out also and it was beautiful...chalk one up for the adventurous half of our team.
Further up the coast, we stopped at a great little town called Pacific City and stayed the night. We found this cute little inn but when I heard it was 90 bucks for a queen bed I got cranky and we drove over an hour looking for other places before crawling back and taking the room. One place was like a scary Holiday Inn and wanted 140 a night...I guess the Northern Coast is more expensive. Well, this place was not damp at all and the bed was the longest queen I've ever seen...great choice.
For dinner in Pacific City we ate at a great place on the river (across from the beach) called the Riverfront. It was highly recommended online and was super. Maybe the best meal I had at that point in the trip!
The next morning we had another great meal at a great little place called Grateful Bread. I'll assume the theme is obvious...Mandi wanted to buy a tie-dyed shirt but I narrowly steered her away!
On up the road we saw an indoor put-put with batting cages...had to stop. I went with the "easier" cage with 60mph pitches but the video shows that it wasn't as smooth as I remembered!
Another lighthouse, beautiful...I agree.
Another town along the way was Oceanside...it was actually off the beaten path by a few miles but totally worth it. Tons of cool homes on the side of the cliffs and a beautiful beach. Probably Mandi's favorite town!
A famous Northern Coast town is Tillamook. Home of a cheese factory that is apparently famous... It was listed as a must see spot so we of course went in. We sampled some great cheese, got frustrated with the amazing amount of tourists and cramped feeling, and then got this great pic below...and just so you know, Mandi chose to be the cow.
I was doing the Captain Morgan pose on a beach cliff but that wasn't captured...something about if Mandi was far enough back to see my legs she would have fallen into the ocean...weak!
Our journey ended at a neat town called Astoria, right across the river from Washington. Since Mandi has never been there, we crossed the river and set foot in Washington...and then promptly went back and found dinner!
Our amazing dinner spot in Astoria, once again highly recommended online. I got Parmesan Snapper that was probably the best fish I've ever eaten!
Our new favorite phrase. Not sure if it exists in Alabama,but it was on lots of novelty stuff along the coast. Mandi tried to personalize it with "slap cheese on my butt and call me grilled cheese!" but I don't think it beats the original...it does crack me up though.
Well, that ends our big Oregon trip, from the Redwood in Northern California to the bottom of Washington and every tiny town in between. Hope you enjoyed it, we really did. We'll miss Oregon for sure...we leave in only 3 weeks! Talk to you all again soon.
Jason
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