Month: August 2014

Saturday, August 3, 2014

It had been a long day already. We had seen some amazing waterfalls, some incredible vistas, and some enormous crowds along the Columbia Gorge. It was time to move on. I didn’t want a repeat of Friday’s scramble to find a place to stay in Portland, so Laura dove into the task of finding us a place for tonight. Our only requirement was that it needed to get us further on our way, preferably somewhere on the Washington State coastline, but not too far of a drive. Laura was successful, but I didn’t know anything about the town or location. Regardless, I set the GPS and we set off.

I-84 took us through downtown Portland and over the Willamette River on another spectacular bridge. We didn’t linger for sightseeing, or even for a photo of the bridge and skyline, but kept going. We left the interstate for the coastal highway, which mimicked our Friday trip over from the coast. We passed through rural lands, then ascended over the coastal range, dropping back down at the appropriately named community of Seaside.

We began seeing signs pointing to historical locations for Lewis and Clark. Seemed fitting. Our last two week road trip was ten years ago, when we followed the Lewis and Clark route across country in another convertible.

The highway followed only a short span of the Oregon Coast before turning back eastward. Most of this was through developed seaside communities. Soon, though, we were crossing the Young’s Bay Bridge toward Astoria. We didn’t linger, though, because we immediately drove onto the Astoria Bridge across the Columbia River.

Read More “Portland, Oregon to Long Beach, Washington” »

Sunday, August 3, 2014

We wanted to get an early start. However, gas and more coffee were calling. We found a Starbucks in the little planned community of Wilsonville, then headed on our way. We circled past Portland on I-205 until we came to an overlook of the Willamette River. We had a good view of the Willamette River Locks.

Soon we found ourselves headed east on I-205, and entering the Columbia River Gorge. The gorge was much wider than I had imagined. I don’t know what I was expecting – perhaps a narrow river gorge like the Green in North Carolina?

Read More “Waterfalls of Columbia Gorge” »

Saturday, August 2, 2014

It was time to continue our trek up the west coast. We weren’t really sure where we would end up today, but from Aunt Ellen we had gotten suggestions about a couple of place we wanted to stop along the way.

We retraced our steps northward from yesterday’s trip, driving along miles and miles of dunes. It would have been tempting to stop at several of the locations with dune overlooks, but with Dunefest in full swing that wasn’t very appealing.

Soon we came to the town of Florence on the Siuslaw River. As we crossed the river we made note of the fascinating architecture of the bridge. It turns out that this is one of the historic bridges along this road designed by Conde McCullough, an architect active during the 1920s and 30s. McCullough had a penchant for adding art deco elements to his designs, such as unusual obelisks at the entrances to the bridge. We had already crossed several of his bridges, including the ones at Coos Bay, Umpqua River, and Gold Beach. This wouldn’t be the last one we crossed today.

The town of Florence looked like it would be a great place to explore, with an interesting waterfront along the Siuslaw. However, we kept going. The dunes also continued, ending abruptly at Cox Rock, near Sea Lion Point. The dunes stretch for over 35 miles of the Oregon Coast, and it was interesting seeing the massive piles of sand right up against the highway in some areas. I had to wonder about the shifting nature of the sands, and how hard it must be to keep the highway clear. I was also glad it wasn’t exceptionally windy in an open top car.

Read More “Coos Bay to Portland” »