Seattle

The first of these days was again used in traveling from Crater Lake to as close to Portland as we could come. The drive up Route 5 is very nice through Oregon with lots of beautiful flowers along the sides of the road as well as magnificent views of Mt. Hood and Mt. St. Helens and I think even Rainier in the distance. We were both too tired to think at the end of the day so we ended up in a motel in Salem Oregon which is just south of Portland. We managed to find a Walmart, did shopping and got my prescriptions refilled which was a piece of cake. We then headed north again for a campsite along the ocean close to where we planned to meet up with Zanne and Justin.
Our first official day in Washington was right on the Pacific Ocean in a lovely campsite right on the beach. There were huge wide sandy beaches but of course the water is very cold. I did collect quite a few sand dollars which I packed carefully for the ride home. The beach was literally littered with bits and pieces of sand dollars and I managed to find 7 that were in good enough shape to take home.

Well, we haven’t managed to fine internet linkage and found out it is against the law in Washington to find unsecured signals so don’t know when this page will get uploaded.

We are on the back end of the trip now for sure. We have about three weeks left of actual travel before getting to LJ’s in North Carolina which I hardly consider travel. I look forward to seeing her new house and making a visit to Mary Jo’s in Gastonia – the best fabric store ever I guess!! I hope it is the first of many visits.

That first day of our official Seattle visit in a campsite on the Pacific was absolutely beautiful until about 7 in the evening when the fog rolled in and then it was cold and damp. With that, we decided to find a better campground closer to the kids so chose Rosewallip State Park on Puget Sound rather than the site on the Pacific we had originally planned.. It turned out not to be directly on any water, nor did it have a view of the mountains but it was gorgeous weather for all the days we were here and it was great for the kids. Zanne managed to sprain her ankle the day before we arrived so she was gimping around a bit but the kids seemed to enjoy being outside and the weather has been truly perfect – again, like Crater Lake, very unusual for this time of year in Seattle. Don’t know what we have ahead of us now. We are planning on taking the ferry tomorrow over to north of Seattle and then heading towards Eastern Washington and onward at some point to Glacier National Park We may find an intermediate stop somewhere.

As we have had showers at this campsite, I feel no great need for a motel except for the internet feature. Maybe when we get to Montana….

One note is that the oysters are just sitting on the beaches here, there are so many. The law is that you must shuck them on the beach so that the shells can be used for others oysters to attach to. The beaches, needless to say, are COVERED with oyster shells. Just like at the Pacific ocean, where there were sand dollars broken all over the beach. Even in Fla, I have not seen that many.


We finally did find a Senior Center that had wireless so we managed to get a little mail out. And we finally crossed over into Seattle as can be seen by Beth's picture against the Seattle skyline. It rained and rained which made us feel like we had seen more of the true Seattle!