On and Off

Woke up to sun here in Florence Oregon, followed by rain, followed by sun, followed by rain, you get the idea. Consequently we stayed in most of the day. Of course Cheye makes us get out for walks a few times during the day, but that was about it.

We did a lot of travel discussion on where to go to in the November - December months. We are slowly coming up with a plan that includes both Thousand Trails campgrounds and others. The plan is to head to the Medina Lake Thousand Trails campground west of San Antonio, TX. I’ve never been to TX and Dave has only driven through part of it so it's all new territory.

People find such unique ways to decorate their campsites. The photos I have posted are of decorated satellite dishes. Bud & Pat (couple we met at Chehalis Thousand Trails) said they saw lots of people in Algodones Mexico painting the satellite dishes. Not sure if that is where these people had their dishes painted or not but they are fun!

Another Cheye Video

I bought a little cart the other day to roll the laundry to the laundry room rather than having Dave carry it or driving the pickup down. This morning I loaded up the soap, laundry, a book and deck of cards and headed out rolling my little cart. Worked great! Dave & Cheye walked down and visited for a bit while I was waiting on the laundry. Once I got back we both did a little computing and had lunch. Then the three of us walked down to the dog run area and were joined by 3 others with their dogs and even though the dogs varied from 4 pounds to 104 pounds they all seemed to have some fun. Later it was dinner and some TV.

We have been discussing where we want to go this winter again. I think we are leaning toward Texas but we haven’t put together a game plan yet. I’d like to fit some Arizona in there too. There is just so many places we’d like to see….I guess we are just going to have to full-time for a long time to fit it all in!

The video today was taken yesterday at South Jetty in Florence Oregon. Cheye just loved being in the ocean again. In the middle of the video Cheye kind of jumps up on her back legs…there was a Seagull overhead so she tried to jump up to get it! I think what amuses me most is remembering her just about 3 months ago…afraid of the ocean. My how she has changed. I still get a laugh at the video I took when she was trying to figure out what the sea foam was… I may have to post that one again, it is worth a second view. :o)

Photos:
Top: a happy wet dog
Middle: Dave & Cheye
Bottom: a Coast Guard cutter going down the river

To the Foggy Beach

We went into town this morning to get mail, run some errands and run a dog. Since we don’t have beach access at the park Cheye hasn’t been able to run in the ocean for at least a week. Poor doggy! We drove down to a State park, I’m afraid I didn’t catch the name but it was by the south Jetty. It was so foggy/misty that we couldn’t see the ocean from the parking lot but we could hear it!. Once we got to the beach Cheye was a crazy dog running and jumping in the ocean. We let her run until she was pooped. (video tomorrow)

From there we went back down to Old Town and had lunch. Again a yummy meal, I had a shrimp sandwich and Dave had a coney dog. After lunch we headed home and relaxed for a while. I took Cheye out for a walk later, then it was dinner time.

Tonight is my final installment of our sightseeing on Tuesday. It is the Old Town area of Florence. Cute shops, beautiful views and some great restaurants, what more could you want? :o)

photos and video:
All taken in the Old Town area of Florence Oregon

Slow Start

My day started slowly today. As I was signing off an email I realized it was after 10:00 a.m. and all I had done so far was feed the dog, get dressed and had coffee, oh and wrote one email. But that is one of the beauties of this life style, no lawn to mow, no weeds to pull, no big house to clean so sitting around till 10:00 is no big deal!

I finally decided I should do something so I started with bank statements. After I finished the three I had sitting here we had lunch and took Cheye for a walk. Once we got back we decided to wash the outside of the windows and then sat outside and just relaxed. The weather was fabulous all day today. We took another long walk before dinner and then we watched a movie.

As I mentioned yesterday I decided to break up the video taken on our sight seeing day Tuesday into three parts. Yesterday was Sea Lion Caves and today it will be Heceta Lighthouse. Here is a website about the lighthouse. I know I posted a short video of the lighthouse a couple days ago, but it was so beautiful up there I figured you wouldn't mind another one!

Hey...yesterday's post was my 100th! Woo-hoo! :o)

photos:
top: Keepers house at Heceta Lighthouse - now a bed and breakfast
middle: the view!
bottom: the lighthouse
video: all from our visit to Heceta Lighthouse

Some more about Sea Lion Caves

Today we woke to gray skies and some light rain. Good thing we did our sight seeing yesterday! The morning and afternoon was taken up by video editing, downloading pictures, a couple walks, and catching up on some emails. We also signed up for the spaghetti dinner tonight over at South Jetty Betty’s diner.

Back from dinner! Very good spaghetti dinner. Spaghetti with meat sauce, garlic bread, salad bar (fruit and green salad) all for $5.75. After dinner we took a long walk around the park. It turned in to a very pretty day, the sun came out about 3:00. A little breezy but not bad at all.

I decided to break up my video from yesterday in 3 parts, Sea Lion Caves, Heceta Lighthouse and then Old Town Florence. There was just too much stuff to put it all in one little video. So tonight is the Sea Lion Caves. The Cave has been a tourist attraction since 1932. Both Dave & I visited with our families when we were kids and then together a few years back. It’s not a place you spend hours at but it is a fun stop. They have a website that includes a webcam looking toward Heceta Lighthouse.

photos:
both taken yesterday at Sea Lion Caves, Florence, OR
video: also Sea Lion Caves

Sea Lion Caves, Heceta Head Lighthouse and Old Town

We decided to go see a few of the local attractions and our first stop was Sea Lion Caves. We have been there before but being good tourists we stopped. Admission to the cave is $10.00 for adults. There were a number of noisy Sea Lions on the rocks outside the cave and a group inside. Last time we were there it was packed with Sea Lions but not as many this time. Still they were interesting and the views are amazing.

From there we went to Heceta Head Lighthouse. There is also the keeper’s house there which is supposedly haunted, I didn’t see it but Dave claims to have seen something inside go by one of the windows, the fact that is it now a bed and breakfast I didn’t doubt him. ;o) It costs $3.00 for parking (no fee to go up to the lighthouse) and is a ½ mile walk from the parking lot but it is beautiful. The lighthouse was built in 1894. Again, the views were fabulous.

Finally we went to Old Town Florence and had lunch. We looked around in a few of the shops and walked a bit on the pier by the river. They have done a great job restoring the area, it is really cute.

I took a lot of video and photos, I haven’t even looked at most of them. I will post some tonight and more tomorrow, maybe even the next day too!!

photos:
top: Gift shop and entrance to Sea Lion Caves
middle: statue at Sea Lion Caves
bottom: View from Heceta Head Lighthouse

Ahhhh.. back in the Sunshine

We made the big move today. We probably moved about a block but we are now in a more open area that gets sunshine. No more having to turn on lights all day long. It feels good. There are still trees around, just not as many. We also get satellite here, we seem to be somewhat on the edge of the signal but for as much TV as we watch it is fine.

Our move took up most of the morning. First we had to wait for the people that were in the site to leave. By the time they left we had most everything packed up we just had to pull in the slide, unhook electric & water, hook up to the pickup and move. Once we settled in it was noon. After lunch we took a walk over to the dog run area. When we got back I did a little pruning…some old dead blackberry vines with nasty thorns. They were right by our door and attacking as we would walk by. Then it was just relax and enjoy the sun. Another walk before dinner, another after dinner. And that about sums up the day!

photos:
top - Cheye in the dog run area
bottom - blackberries
video - our new spot at South Jetty

Laundry

Today’s activities ended up revolving around laundry. It started off simply enough, I decided to go do a couple loads of laundry. The washing part was fine. While the clothes were in the machine I found a puzzle someone had started so I was working on that when I met a woman from Yuma, AZ. We had a nice chat. I have heard good things about Yuma and would like to visit it sometime. Once the clothes were done I put them in the dryer and fed it enough quarters for about 40 minutes. I went back to the puzzle and conversation. After 40 minutes some of my clothes were partially dry, others were not. To make a long story short we discovered that the dryers were not working. These are propane dryers and the propane had some how run out so they were not getting any heat. :o( So I loaded up our soggy clothes and went back to the trailer. We went ahead and ate lunch and then drove into town to use the laundromat. After the clothes were dry (btw - I met someone else from the campground drying their clothes too!) we stopped at the market and bought groceries since we were in town. By the time we got home it was about 3:00. Just think, if the dryers had worked I could have come back to the trailer and done something worth while, like take a nap. :o) Just kidding, this way I got a couple chores taken care of.

Tomorrow we are going to see about moving sites. It means packing up stuff and then setting back up but I think it will be worth it. It clouded up and is raining so it’s really dark in our trailer today. It’s kind of like being in a cave and I really don’t care for caves! ;o)

photos:
Both were taken when going over the Siuslaw Bridge in Florence. The bridge opened in 1936 and is really beautiful. Hopefully while we are here I can find a place to get a better shot of the bridge itself.
video: Shots from around the South Jetty Campground here in Florence Oregon

Dinner and a Show

This morning Cheye and I went for a long walk all around the park. Dave & Cheye go for early walks (like about 6:00 a.m.) and Dave mentioned something about a pet run area. So when Cheye & I went about 10:00 a.m. we found the pet area so Cheye got to wander around and sniff everything unencumbered by a leash. From there we followed every little road we could find. We ended up at the entry gate and then headed back. After that it was the usual computing, lunch, talking about future places to visit and then some more computing.

No TV in this site, we are too deep in the trees. The Park Ranger told us we could move Monday if we couldn’t get satellite in the site we were assigned and we very well may take them up on it. Not so much because we get no satellite, more because we have no sun light! It’s very dark in the trees and the site we would move to is more open.

This evening the diner here at the park was serving a Prime Rib dinner, so we signed up. It was really good, Prime Rib, baked potato, veggies, roll and a salad all for $10.50. We sat with a couple from Massachusetts that had RV’d across the country. Nice couple. About an hour after dinner a guy named Dave Black, a local entertainer, sang and played the guitar for us all. It was quite an entertaining evening!

photos:
top: a view in the park
middle: our site here in Florence
bottom: the dinner crowd
video: our RV site here in Florence

South Jetty

The park here in Florence is called South Jetty. From what I have seen of it the park seems very pretty. Lots of trees and greenery, a beautiful Activity Center, pool, basketball, etc. They even have a diner with fairly inexpensive breakfast and dinners Thursday through Sunday.

The city of Florence looked very nice. A Safeway and Fred Meyer for general shopping and I read somewhere there is an “old town” area that is nice to explore. The big tourist thing here is the sand dunes. People bring, or rent, dune buggies and zoom up and down the dunes.

Our trip down was beautiful. Blue sky, sunshine along with the great vistas on Hwy. 101 was a great combination. As usual we got in about noon, set up and ate lunch. We took a short stroll through part of the park and then relaxed for the afternoon and evening. Tomorrow we will do a little more exploring. It’s fun to be somewhere new!


Photos:
Top: the Activity Center
Middle: the pool area
Bottom: sun rays through the trees as we left Pacific City
Video: clips from our trip down to Florence

Here Comes the Sun...

Finally about 1:00 pm we got blue skies and sunshine which is great! Yeah! It makes everything feel better, even if is it still kinda damp.

We were expecting mail today so we went into town about 10:00 this morning. We picked up our mail and when we got to the main intersection in town we decided to explore a bit…glad we did! We found an entirely different part of Pacific City. A new and very populated part of Pacific City. There is a public beach access at an area called Cape Kiwanda and it is a beautiful beach. Haystack Rock is directly in front of you, out in the ocean of course. There is a huge and very steep sand dune to the north that people were hiking up and sliding down. The three of us took a short walk but it started to rain so we took Cheye back to the pickup and we went to breakfast at the Pelican Pub and Brewery. The servings were huge so we got take out boxes and Cheye got to have some pancakes. Next time we come to Pacific City we will definitely go down to that beach access again.

After that it was a major cleaning day. Vacuuming, dusting, scrubbing the inside of the trailer from one end to the other. I even dusted off the vacuum cleaner. Dave did some packing up of the outside stuff, lawn chairs, little tables and one of the ground mats we bought. We had dinner - steak, onions and tomatoes fried and served in flour tortillas - and then Dave took Cheye for a walk. I stayed at the trailer, I’m still working on getting my pc all tweaked. When they replaced the CPU and updated the bios it seems to have affected a couple things so I am trying to straighten it all out. Tomorrow it’s off to Florence Oregon.

Photos:
Top: Cheye and Haystack Rock (not to be confused with Haystack Rock at Canon Beach!)
Middle: Pelican Pub and Brewery
Bottom: Sand dune
Video: beach at Cape Kiwanda

A Trip to Salem, Oregon

Well, I have my Sony Vaio back! Yeah! They had to replace the CPU so I still have all the stuff on my hard drive which is great. There was even a little letter from Sony apologizing that my Vaio had to go in to repair. I know, it was just a form letter, but still it was a nice touch. I’m also impressed that Best Buy not only sent my laptop to the Salem store for me but they actually called me when it got to Salem. If I had a nickel for every business that said they would call me and didn’t…. well… we’d be driving a big Class A :)

Salem is about an hour and a half from here, we got there about 11:30, picked up my Sony and wandered around the store. Saw the new Flip Video Mino and some lovely Macs, I think I may have drooled a bit. Dave bought a mapping program and I got a new little bag for my Flip Video (I lost the one it came with). After that we had lunch and drove back. It made the day go really fast. Once we got back I spent some time catching up Quicken stuff… a months worth. I also took Cheye out for a short walk. She came with us to Salem, she really is a great traveling dog.

It rained most of the day again today. It’s almost 8:00 p.m. and has finally quit raining for the day. Tomorrow I plan to clean and organize since we will be leaving Pacific City Friday morning. I’m hoping the rain doesn’t follow us!

Left: Best Buy in Salem
Right: A Christmas Tree Farm we passed on the way
Video: from a couple days ago, notice the sand blowing at the beginning

Still Raining

We went in to Pacific City this morning to get our mail and decided to have breakfast at the same restaurant we stopped at the other day. Shortly after we got back the phone rang and it was Best Buy telling me my computer has made it to the Salem store so we will go pick it up tomorrow. Yeah! I still don’t know what they fixed, if they replaced the hard drive I may have to pick up a program or two. (Note to self: computer programs should be stored in the trailer not storage unit)

We took a walk on the beach this morning and got caught in a rain squall. We got a little wet, Cheye got soaked. Dave was throwing a stick for her out into the surf and she loved it. After we got back I went over to do some laundry. I took my laptop along to pass the time and ran into Earl and Sheila up at the Lodge wifi area. We were parked across the street from them in Chehalis. We’ve seen them a few times since we got to Pacific City, but today we had some time to chat. It’s kind of fun, I’ve seen a few people and a few RV’s I recognized from the other Thousand Trails parks we have stayed at. I knew we would, I just didn’t expect to be so soon!

photos:
top: Dave & Cheye while we were on a walk in the park
middle: Haystack rock
bottom: Dave throwing the stick for Cheye

Foggy and Soggy

Another rainy day here at Pacific City, OR. I now understand why people buy that stuff that is supposed to control moisture in your RV. With all this rain everything just feels damp inside the trailer. Windows fog up, towels never get dry, if you don’t seal the chips or crackers tightly they get soggy. When we were in Long Beach we were chatting with our neighbors Ted & Diane about the weather on the coast. I said I wondered why more people don’t spend the winter on the Oregon coast with it’s mild temperatures. Ted said they tried it once and had a real battle with moisture to the point that clothing they had in garment bags got mildew and had to be thrown away! Hopefully things will dry up in a few days.

This morning, and into the afternoon I have been working on a project I planned to do before we hit the road, scanning recipes on to my hard drive. My plan is to get rid of all of my cookbooks and slips of paper I have recipes written on. Not the most exciting project but it will feel good to get it done, and as a bonus I found a couple new recipes!

top: another pic from our beach walk last night...it really shows the way the Flip Video turned the sun black!
bottom: a banner in front of a RV
video: a short clip of Chipmunks...Cheye was frozen staring out the window when we noticed these 2 on a stump beside the trailer

Ever Changing Weather

This morning we went down to the Lodge and had breakfast. I had french toast and scrambled eggs, Dave had biscuits and gravy with bacon. Not bad, and it was fun to do something different. Cheye and I went for a walk a little later and shortly after we returned the changing weather started. It started with fog which turned to rain, thunder and lightening and finally broken clouds with a little blue sky and sunshine! And that was all by 1:30. It continued in cycles all afternoon. Cheye and I did get out for another walk in the afternoon between rain showers. Besides that it was an inside day of internet, solitaire and the Olympics.

After dinner the three of us took a walk and seeing the sun peeking through the clouds we decided to go to the beach. Good decision! Amazingly dramatic clouds and beautiful surf. The wind was severe so we didn’t stay long, but Cheye got in a good run and we soaked in the beautiful scene.

I finally figured out how to add a google map of our travels thus far. I may try to add a picture to each “pin” . I’m not sure if I’ll try to add lines showing the route we drove. Since we have gone over the same roads a few times I’m not sure how that would look, or even how I’d differentiate them. We’ll see.


photos:
top left: the lodge at breakfast
middle: dramatic clouds at the beach
bottom: foggy morning
video:the beach this evening...when the sun hits the lens the little Flip Video couldn't quite handle it and turned the sun black, almost looks like there was an eclipse! :)

Cool Weather in Pacific City, OR

Today I talked to my sister-in-law (Zel) who lives in Yakima, WA and to my Mom (and nephew Michael) in Vancouver, WA, both places were up over 100 degrees today... not here, a very comfy high 60’s. Glad we are here, that over 100 temperatures is one of the reasons we wanted to get away from the Yakima Valley. The only down side is we still have fog here, but I’ll take the fog.

I started the day with laundry. I took my laptop with me to use the wireless connect in the Lodge. I forgot you can buy breakfast up at the Lodge on Saturday and Sunday,so I had a lot of company while I surfed. I had just gone back down to the laundry room when Dave &
Cheye came to visit. They headed back to the trailer, I followed once everything was dry.

We decided to go out to dinner in Lincoln City tonight. Lincoln City was really crowded, probably people trying to escape the heat inland over the weekend. We went to Captain Ron’s and had a yummy dinner, I had scallops and twice baked potato while Dave had halibut and chips. Now we are are back at the trailer watching the Olympics and with our tummies being extremely full I expect sleep will come soon!

photos:
left: foggy
right: Driving through Lincoln City, Oregon
video: I call this “It Came Out of the Ocean”

In a Fog

We were fogged in today. The picture to the left was taken at 10:30 this morning while we were out on a walk. It kind of cleared up about 2:30 only to roll in again about 4:00. We did go down to the beach during the least foggy time. Cheye had a great run and got dripping wet again. We did manage to keep her from rolling much in the sand which was nice.

Our RPI membership is all set up. When I called again today they started to tell me that I needed to go through Thousand Trails be we got that straightened out. Evidently the magic words are “we bought a transfer membership to 1000 Trails” that seems to make a difference.

Besides our couple of walks today we managed to fit in a nap, some computing and a little cleaning. Tomorrow I want to get up early and get down to the laundry room to do two loads of laundry. Not a lot of fun but I would really rather not run out of clean clothes!! :)

photos:
top left: fog at 10:30 this morning
middle: glowing clouds while we were at the beach
bottom left: foggy surf
video: Cheyenne and the bunnies. At the end I wish I could put a thought bubble over Cheye’s head saying “Please?”

A Phone Call Day

We went into Pacific City this morning to get our mail. On our way back we decided to stop for breakfast at a little restaurant. It was a good breakfast, crispy hash browns, eggs done as ordered, sour dough toast and crunchy bacon. We then went to Cloverdale, about 2 miles north on 101, to stop at the bank. After that it was back to the trailer.

We are trying to get signed up for 2 other campground memberships; RPI (Resort Parks International) and ROD (Resorts of Distinction). It got a bit crazy but after making phone calls and then waiting for call backs then making more calls I think we finally have everything figured out. Thousand Trails is sending us an application for ROD and we will call RPI back tomorrow (they closed before we could call them back today) and we’ll get signed up with them.

I also called Best Buy about my PC... it is supposedly repaired and on it’s way. :) We got our South Dakota license plates and vehicle registration in the mail so I called the insurance broker to get our policies changed over to a South Dakota broker. I’m so glad I kept our regular cell phone plan, I had thought of going to a per minute plan because I figured we wouldn’t be using the phone much... wrong!!!

Needless to say we didn’t get out much during the afternoon. I took Cheye for a walk and then Dave went for a walk a little later. He caught a few of the many bunnies here in the park on video. Hopefully tomorrow we will make it down to the beach although I have to say it’s been nice to have a dry dog for a day! :)

photos:
top and bottom left: the beach at Pacific City, OR
middle right: the view from my lawn chair
video: a few of the bunnies in the park

Lots of Walks

We had a great day back at Pacific City. This morning Dave & Cheye went for a walk early, Cheye and I went for a walk a little later in the morning. After lunch the three of us walked down to the beach and Cheye went straight for the water. Back to her usual chasing after birds in flight out into the ocean and she got soaked! It was kind of weird weather, warm but mist blowing by. We had a good walk and then headed back to the trailer for lunch.

This afternoon we got caught up on the Olympics and then headed over to the little store and got ice cream cones. We left Cheye back at the trailer so Dave felt she needed a little treat when we got back... see the video below.

I made corn chowder for dinner and after yet another walk we are all in for the evening. I think watching all those kids in the Olympics has subconsciously spurred us to walk more. After watching soccer, water polo, beach volleyball, swimming and gymnastics I can only wonder...where do they get all that energy?? I don’t recall ever having that much!

photos:
top left: trail to the beach
middle: Cheye at the beach
bottom left: foggy beach
video: extremely spoiled dog