To my Mother, Dorothy Jean Pruner, 05/22/22 - 10/20/2004. On the anniversary of Mother’s death, I want to acknowledge one of the many gifts that she inspired in me… the wanderlust of traveling. Her Mother, Mildred, inspired the same in her. So, as a tribute to Dorothy and Mildred, and a deep felt thankfulness for their spirit of travel and new experiences, I want to continue the family tradition…in loving memory and gratitude, daughter Linda.
October 14-20, 2007
Got into Portland after dark and we found a Walmart parking lot to spend the night. Had our own little tail-gaiting party. We pulled out the chairs, table and wine goblets and grilled ourselves some chicken. Had a lovely dinner in that parking lot along with a few truckers and a broken down C-class motorhome.
It’s a good thing that it rained, and rained, and rained for 7 days while we were in the Portland area. We were able to catch-up, hunker down and work. Blah. The rain was off and on mostly. Downtown Portland is a vibrant place. We drove around aimlessly for an hour or so one night, getting lost then getting un-lost. We like to do things like that. Aren’t we exciting? What was really exciting was the pack of fox crossing the highway, they were everywhere, running back and forth and padding along the guardrails! Freaky.
A highlight for me was a flamenco class that I picked up on Wednesday night. A class of approximately 30 young, old, in between, male and female students with tons of tatoos and body piercings. Had an Asian instructor and a middle-aged Americano guitarist, teaching a bulerias.
and rained.
One big eye-opener for us was a law in Oregon that prohibits pumping your own gasoline. They have attendants at all stations. The only other state that has this law is New Jersey (according to a Safeway gas attendant).
We had a new camera for awhile…a Panasonic Lumix with a Leica lens. Our Casio Exelim is so beat up and the battery is at the end of it’s life. We have not been able to find a replacement battery, so after hours…days…weeks of shopping for a new camera, we made a decision!!! This is while we are getting new brakes on the Jeep. We end up returning the new camera because it does not have infinity focus and our pictures were not sharp. Strange…we could not get a sharp image with auto-focus.
Last day in Portland we took a rainy, scenic drive along the Columbia River Gorge. We saw several magnificent waterfalls, including the Horsetail falls, which is a 178′ high, 15′ wide waterfall that plunges down a cliff in the shape of a giant, white horsetail.
…and poured rain.
We sure have seen a lot of rainbows!!!
October 20, 2007.
Breaking away from the rain to reach our Calistoga, CA destination deadline of Oct. 25th, heading South on 101 we make it as far as Coos Bay, OR. Jim liked the name of the city and needed a break from driving. We found a parking place on the side of the highway in the main part of town and boondocked overnight.
October 21, 2007
Making our way South on 101 we stop in the seaside town of Bandon? for lunch and find yet another quaint place to vacation. There are many seaside houses for rent and has a small town feel. At this point, I am especially giddy about being in the sun and next to the ocean. The southern Oregon coast was spectacular, and not at all over-developed.