Hood Park, Pasco, Wa.

    We had a nice drive here along the Washington side of the Gorge.  Mary & Denny met us at the gate of this beautiful Army Corps of Engineer run park. That runs along the Snake river that dumps into the Columbia river about a 1/2 mile to the west. Since they are working today Monday June 24th Mary was at the guard shack.  We have lots of trees, grass and plenty of space between campers. Of coarse the satellite dish is pointed into trees and although John has tried with the portable, just can't get it to lock on. Oh well, we at least get local channels.  We only have electricity here so have to learn to be conservative on our holding tanks.  Tues John & I took a ride around and went to Preston winery and found they are only open on weekends so have to come back.  We stopped at a fruit market, jam and syrup and candy market and looked around but didn't stay since Denny & Mary want to take us here.  Found a sign for cherries and stopped and picked Bing and Rainer (the yellow ones) for $2 a pound.  Of course we ate some as we picked.  It is a family's cherry tree orchard and the kids that helped us were great-we want to bring the group back to pick. Everyone has arrived now and we fixed BBQ'ed chicken for everyone with Denny cooking the chicken.  I have lost track of the days and been busy with everybody.  We went to pick cherries with the group along, stopped at the Mercantile Fruit Market and ate our way through with tastings of salsa, chocolate, fruits and such and bought a few goodies. We went to dinner at a local tavern and had the best hamburgers!  Thurs we all went on a private tour of Ice Harbor Dam.  It was a great tour since we were the only ones and we got a tour of the dam and watched the fish climb the fish ladder and be counted.  Friday was our drive to Pendleton, Oregon to do the underground tour there.  It was great to travel under the sidewalks of old town and see where the Chinese had laundry store and opium den, the card rooms, brothels, a Meat Market , Ice cream parlor, and learn about the life underground and see all the old stuff that is still there.  Our guide played in those tunnels as a boy so he was very knowledgeable and had great stories to tell.  We went to a Mexican Restaurant across the street after our 2 hour tour (longer than suppose to be) and had really good but different food.  Than we drove to the Pendleton Wool Factory.  We had a good tour mostly seeing since nobody's audio worked.  Fun to look at all the beautiful colors of wool yarn and how it is processed and there made into blankets.  Shirts and other garments made in another factory here in Oregon.  It has turned HOT here and been using the air and sitting outside with Mattie in the evenings.  She loves the grass and playing ball.  More to come later.  Hope  you are all staying cool since it seems the whole west coast is hot. JVP

Goldendale, Washington

 Montana grasslands

 Driving early in the morning

 Museum and history of the small town of Bickleton, Wa.

Scott's front yard and Garden.

Well we can finally do a post.  We had poor signals for phones and computer so haven't done much with posting.  We spent the last few days with Scott & Doreen parked in their driveway.  Spent our time there playing games in evening, eating-we ate in   town and had prime rib in a house converted to a restaurant.  We drove over to Bickelton and went through the museum of old cars and family heirlooms.  It was bigger a few years ago but is more organized now.  Also went to a carousel museum and saw a lot of beautiful old painted horses from a merry go round.  I flew home for a week for a wedding shower (my Grandson Cody's fiance) and John went gopher hunting in Montana at the Vermillion Ranch.  I loved being home with the family and the sunshine as we haven't seen much of it here on our Northwest trip. It has been cool and rainy here in Goldendale too.  We are still living up to our reputation of bringing rain wherever we go. We got our car back and transmission is fixed and working good.  John & I are trying to get use to traveling in our motor home again.  We have forgotten where things are, I forgot how to start the car since I haven't been in it for a while, we forgot where we put our towing stuff for the car and stuff like that.  Mattie has had a great time playing with the dogs here and getting fed from the table.  Doreen took good care of her while we were both gone.

Portland, Oregon

We had a nice drive through forest land and coastal mountains to get here to our campground outside of Portland.  Since we had a nice sunny day we BBQ chicken and even ate outside.  It was so nice to be out with no wind and the sun shine.  Sunday we drove through downtown Portland and the wharf area and than went to have Mexican food and Husong & Larry's, which is located on the Columbia river next to the draw bridge on I-5.  We took the car over to the Ford dealer on Monday morning as we have had transmission problem since we left home.  Took it to our dealer twice and they said nothing was wrong so we have waited until it got worse and there were times when we were out, we weren't sure if it was going to shift or shift so hard we would stop.  They are rebuilding the transmission now and hopefully will be done by Thursday, if not we will pick it up in a week when John picks me up from the airport.  Pat & Elmon left to see their friends up by Tacoma so we are here by ourselves.  The weather has changed-cool and cloudy and an occasionally showers.  We have visited Walmart and & Costco and done a little shopping as well as Camping World.  John & Elmon installed our new steps which work really nice and then did our new satallite Dish, model the Traveler and it works really well and not noisy while it finds the satelite.  So this stop has been a fix it time.  Today John & I drove on the Oregon side to see the Bonneville Dam, constructed in 1938. It was fun to see the fish swimming up the ladder out to the Ocean, and all that water coming out of the dam. JVP

Cannon Beach

Well, we are glad to be on the road and away from cold, wind and fog in this city and hope the next spot will be better.  Arrived here in Cannon Beach and our spot was being worked on-they had a water leak and had to dig down to the pipe.  We parked in a vacant spot till it was fixed rather than setting up and moving the next day to our spot.  Riley (Pat & Elmon's cat) hung out by our waiting spot as he doesn't like all the noise where we are suppose to be.  This is a real big campground and very full.  We had a SUNNY day and were able to sit outside.  There are 4 other Alegro Busses here so we have met some of them and talked about their experiances.  Today (Friday) was cloudy and cool but no wind.  We drove down to Seaside and went out on the beach. Mattie couldn't find any friends but enjoyed the walk.  We looked around the shops and came home for lunch.  In the afternoon we drove down to see the huge rock (Haystack) which is seen in most of the pictures here in Oregon.  This is a quaint town with lots of homes, condo's and hotels where Seaside is more tourist stuff and for family vacations.  We ate our last meal that we will have of seafood along the coast.  Of course it was fish & chips, Pat had Salmon and John had fried clams. This is our last stop along the coast and tomorrow we head inland toward Portland. JVP

Another cold day at Newport, Oregon

Wind has blown all day and fog coming in most of the day.  We started the day at Oregon State University Science Center.  We walked over and enjoyed all the exhibits and what they are studying with the ocean, sea life and tsunami's.  There was a piece of concrete from a dock that came all the way from Japan.  They studying all the plant and animal stuff that came across the ocean with it.  We saw a big Pacific Octopus and a nice tide pool to touch the clams, anaemia's and starfish.  We had lunch in the motor home and than went to Oregon Coast Aquarium.  It was a great experience.  We watched them feed the birds ( puffins, auklets, and murres), sea lion and harbor seal and than the otters.  The girls were very informative at each one of the stations and got to see everything close up.  The jelly fish were beautiful and we walked through a tunnel above, below and around us with all kinds of fish, sharks, and sting rays.  We ate dinner out and I had clam fettuccine and the rest had sour dough bread bowls with clam chowder or fish stew.  Tomorrow we leave for our next camping spot and doesn't sound like we will get away from this cold and wind and may even get rain.  Sunny Portland is in our future!

Newport Days Two

Yesterday was another windy, biting cold wind.  We all lounged around in the morning and than took off for sightseeing.  We visited 2 lighthouses here-one the tallest and the other the only wooden one left.  Can't go in the tallest.  Around that lighthouse are millions of birds on the rocks and very noisy.  Also saw some sea lions. Than we drove to Nye Beach and had a special clam chowder they have here that has shrimp on top and some have cheese that makes like a crust.  It was very good. John & I checked out the local Walmart, Mattie liked walking on their grass.  For dinner we went to the Rogue Brewery which is near here.  We didn't get there in time for the brewery tour and John & Elmon tried out their beer and we had hamburgers.  I tried their root beer which was different but very good. Played a game of dice at our place before retiring for the evening.  Glad to hear from some of you that are reading this blog.

Newport, Oregon

It has been VERY WINDY here at this campground.  We set up and Elmon ,Pat & I walked over to Oregon State University Science Center to watch them feed the Pacific Octopus.  It was imasing to watch her eat 2 small fish and a clam as big as your fist.  She put it all in her mouth and than works on it so you don't actually see her eat it.  Our campsite is under this beautiful bridge and between the 2 jettys.  This is a fishing port and we can see the boats from here.  They fish day &  night and ship it all over.  A lot of oysters here and also crab.  Last night we went for dinner over by the harbor.  There is a fish market and restaurant together with the best gourmet foods. I had the crab cakes and they were the best I"ve eaten.  John & Pat tried fish tacos and Elmon had fish.  We drove around and just checked out the area. Have a problem with our steps now and will get a new set when we get to Portland.  The bolt sheared off and can't get anybody to fix it for several weeks.  You'd think dealers could take care of emergencys but doesn't seem like it and they all seam to be very busy.
    We remember our good friend, Paul Moorefield  taking us here many years ago and showing us around. Thats all for now, JVP

Florence, Oregon

Today we traveled 50 miles up the coast on Hwy 101 to Florence.  Our campground is in the trees and each spot is private.  We wanted to walk down to the beach but have to drive to it and not like our last beach.  It has been windy, cool in the 50's and mostly cloudy while we were here and this morning, Sunday it sprinkled a little.  Sat, we drove over towards Eugene to King Estate Winery where John had his birthday lunch.  We had nice wine and a gourmet lunch outside.  It is sunny and in the 70's here (I enjoyed the warmth.  We drove up the coast a way and saw the Heceta Head Lighthouse and below us were the seals from the Caves sunning themselves on the rocks.  I don't know how they get up on those jagged rocks, also birds nesting.  We ate dinner at a local restaurant-I had a fried platter of prawns, scallops, oysters, and fish.  Had to try the oysters as the coast is known for them.  They were pretty good fried.  We walked around Old Town today and got some things in the quaint little shops and had lunch in the Zebra Bar.  We eat a lot and not enough exercise, so not good.  We drove around and looked at the sand dunes around here.  There are some big ones between here and Coos Bay but can't see them from highway.  The dunes here go right to the ocean and it is really sandy soil for the plants and grass here. We went to Fred Meyer (Oregon's Super Walmart) and looked around, got gas and stocked up on what we need and we plan on Hamburgers for dinner but it is pretty windy and we aren't too hungry after our big lunch.  Probably a night for snacks and maybe finish up birthday cake.  Tomorrow we move up the coast about 50 miles to Newport, Oregon.  We have settled into the motor home and things are working well.  The car however still continues to have shifting problems which our dealer said nothing was wrong. Have appointment to have it looked at down the road around Portland, somewhere. That's all for now, JVP

Last Days of Coos Bay

We walked down to the beach at low tide and saw these starfish.  Also saw a crab hiding in a rock and a snail, lots of clam shells attached to the mossy rocks.  John sat on the rocks which had a beautiful pattern. We went to the house of myrtlewood and watched them making bowls and a movie on how they cut the wood(100 year old trees) and them carve them for plates, bowls, jewlery and decorative things.  We bought a beautiful salad bowl which they were just putting the lacquer on and we came back later to get it.  Also went to a cranberry candy factory and watched them making the candys and sampled so many of them.  Sun was out so we BBQ steaks.