Finally out of Washington

Before we left Washington we visited the beach and the Quinalt Indian Casino in Ocean Shores.  Both of us left there a little lighter in the pockets but we did enjoy the seafood buffet.

We had to leave VERY early in the morning to head for Kelso because of the Logger Play Days in Hoquiam.  Since there is only one road in and one road out we didn’t want to get stuck there because of the parade of logging trucks.  We were actually on the road before 8:00 in the morning!!  It was a pretty easy drive of only 100 miles and we arrived at Brookhollow RV Park and set up earlier than we normally would have even been out of bed!!  We just hung out for the day before grilling up some halibut along with rice, salad, zucchini and angel food cake with fruit for dessert.

Monday we headed out to see Mt St Helen’s.  If you remember, back on May 18, 1980 it exploded out the side of the mountain and sent tons of trees and mud down through the valley below.  Rod and I visited it about 15 years ago and it looks quite different today.  When we visited the last time they were building a new interpretive center and we could see the construction going on from where we were.  We were amazed at how close the new center was to the crater.  Now we got to see it REALLY up close!  There was a movie showing the events leading up to the explosion and the whole story of what happened.  When the movie ended the screen rose up and through the HUGE picture window we were right in front of the mountain!

We walked up the path to get a better view but the clouds were refusing to lift.  Dortha, Ellie and I blew with all our might to get the clouds to lift and they finally departed just a little bit so we could get a decent picture.

On our way back to our RV park we saw another RV park that I’m pretty glad we were NOT going to try to get into.

Tuesday we headed for Astoria and Cannon Beach in Oregon.  We are so close to the Oregon/Washington border so it was an easy day trip.  We packed up a picnic lunch to enjoy on the way.

Ellie wanted to check out a quilt shop in Astoria so Mark, Jim, Rod and I found something we liked better, a wine shop!  Rod was looking for some Columbia Crest Merlot but when I asked the lady there if she carried it she said, “No, you’ll find that brand at Safeway or Costco”.  Okay, then…

We headed for Fort Stevens State Park to see the wreck of the Peter Iredale which was a four masted ship that ran ashore in 1906 and has slowly eroded away so there’s not much of it left.  Why it was just left there to rust away I have no idea.

Ellie’s dogs had such a good time running on the beach.

We saw LOTS of marine life in the tide pools by Haystack Rock which is quite the tourist attraction at Cannon Beach.

     

I had put a pork tenderloin in the crockpot before we left home so when we got back Rod “pulled” it, Jim brought over some bbq sauce and buns, Dortha made some baked beans and we had sandwiches for dinner along with Glen & Sylvia who had just stopped in overnight before continuing their trip down the Oregon coast.

This morning we left Kelso at about 11:00 as we had only a 56 mile trip to our destination in Troutdale.  We’re now in Oregon!!  We finally made it out of Washington after three long months.  We’ll be staying here for five days and then leaving for the Oregon coast.  We have no idea where we’re going yet but you’ll know as soon as we get there.