Sherwood, Oregon

Had to say goodbye to our friends, at least for a while. Our friend Russ, and his daughter and son-in-law, had gone out on a fishing boat early Saturday morning and caught their limit of salmon. Saturday night we had a salmon feast over at the Purscell’s park. Bill and Lynette were there also. Nine people and there was still salmon left over.
We arrived at the Sherwood, Oregon Elks Lodge early Sunday afternoon after an uneventful three hour drive from drizzly Long Beach. The Lodge is located on a hill with a great view of the wooded hills surrounding Sherwood. Sherwood is a suburb of Portland, located about 15 miles south, just off I-5. The Lodge has 22 RV sites and when we arrived there were only a couple open sites. Normally the Lodge is closed on Sunday and Monday, but they were having a "Family Day" on Sunday afternoon, so we were able to visit. Very friendly and fun Lodge. The First Lady, Tina, was behind the bar and went out of her way to make us feel welcome. The ER, Tony Baker, spent quite a while chatting with us. At one point a squirt gun fight broke out - this is apparently a relatively common occurrence. In fact, their newsletter has a blurb about their first lodge meeting in August being held outside after a BBQ, and has a note at the bottom, "Squirt Guns Optional!" If any Elks are in the area, you should definitely make a visit to the Sherwood Elks Lodge.
Monday we took a ride into Portland to do some shopping and to visit a nice little restaurant called "Pause Kitchen & Bar." During most of my period as a professional home owner association manager I worked for a lady named Lynn Gilliam. Her son, Capron, moved to Portland and recently opened Pause. We were there, along with Lynn and her husband Tom, back in June, and we wanted to stop and say hi to Capron since we were in the area. Unfortunately, Capron was not in on Monday, so we just had a drink and headed out. Our experience from June brings a strong recommendation to try Pause for dinner if you are in the Portland area. It has a very eclectic menu and the food is excellent. Pause is located at 5101 N Interstate. Towards the North end of town on the East side of the river. Say hi to Capron for us.
After visiting Pause, we stopped by the Tualitan, Oregon Elks Lodge, located in (surprise!) Tualitan, just East of Sherwood. We had visited this lodge twice while we were here in 2005 and never could get a lodge pin. This time we did. Only people there were the bartender and one member, but they were quite friendly. Worth a visitation by traveling Elks.
Today is Tuesday, and we left Sherwood at about 10:30 this morning to drive down to Silverton. Silverton is located about 10 miles East of Salem. We have to be in Salem at the fairgrounds on Sunday morning for the Monaco International Motorcoach Rally. We are staying at the Silver Spur RV Park. A very nice park with pull-through spaces, free cable and wifi, and full hookups with 50 amps. Its also a Passport America park so we got three of our days at half price, only $14 a night. Friday and Saturday are full-fare because this weekend is Davenport Days in Silverton. Supposed to be a fun small-town celebration. Will report on the festivities after the weekend.
Over and Out for Now.

Astoria Elks Lodge

We finally were able to visit the Astoria, Oregon Elks Lodge yesterday afternoon. Astoria is about 25 miles south of Long Beach across the Columbia River. We have been to Astoria a couple times during our stay in the area, but the Lodge is closed on Sunday, Monday and Wednesday and doesn't open the other days until 4:00 pm. Yesterday we had to go into Warrington (suburb of Astoria) to get our mail from the UPS center and we went by the Lodge, arriving right at 4:00.
Trish, the bartender, was very nice and showed us around the lodge since we were the only ones there at that time. The Lodge owns a large three story building right in downtown Astoria. The bottom floor is mostly rental space, the second floor is the club room and dining room, and the third floor is the Lodge room. There is also a four-lane bowling alley in the basement. Trish took us up to the Lodge room - very beautiful, probably one of the top five we've seen in our travels. Very ornate columns and ceiling and the formal thrones for the stations.
Best part of the visit - Jackie put ten bucks in one of the slot machines (most Oregon Lodges have State-run video slots) and hit four deuces for $170. She switched machines, put in ten bucks and hit a royal flush for $300!! YIPEE! $300 went into the cruise kitty for our September Alaska cruise - party on!
If you're an Elk, try to visit the Astoria Lodge if your in the area and ask to see the Lodge Room.

Long Beach, Washington

Well, we have seen marginal improvement in the weather. The rain has stopped, but the sun is still usually hiding behind a coastal overcast. On Tuesday we had a nice sunny day but the wind was blowing about 35 mph. I suppose that’s the reason they have a kite festival here every summer. Tuesday we tried fishing at Black Lake, just south of here in Ilwaco. Worked (sic) at it for a couple hours but didn’t get any bites. First time I have fished in at least 10 years.
Since we will be leaving here in a couple days I will devote a big part of today’s dialogue to “Recommendations for the Long Beach Peninsula.”
Long Beach Elks Lodge - Located right in downtown (all of three blocks) Long Beach. The bar is open everyday but there is not much more going on there. We (us, the Purscell’s and their friend Russ) did have dinner there both Friday and Saturday, the only times they serve meals. Friday was a buffet which was surprisingly good for five bucks. Three different entrees, salad and sides. We had heard that Saturday night was normally steak night, but this past weekend they had prime rib. Not bad, but kind of small portions for $12. Both meals were well attended, but (as would be expected) mostly visiting members and guests. The few regular local members who were working the lodge were pretty friendly. All in all, if you’re an Elk worth at least one visit.
Marsh’s Free Museum - Also located in downtown Long Beach, Marsh’s harkens back to the “good old days” when the main highways were two lane and the tourist traps abounded. The place is a “gift shop” with the ususal beach-town souvenirs and tourist kitsch, but it is packed to the ceiling (quite literally) with a variety of collectibles and oddities. Among the things you will see: A shrunken head from Jivaro Indians in South America, "Mary Lou," a complete human skeleton discovered in someone's closet in Aberdeen, the Wyoming Werewolf (a cleverly modified deer butt), and a baby lamb with eight legs and one head. Around the shop are a variety of mechanical peep shows, old carnival type Test-Your-Love-Power coin op machines, and a rather large collection of rare antique music players. Also look for "Morris the Cat" - Named after the TV pet food commercial feline, Morris was the store pet until he died. Then he became the store's stuffed pet. The oddity most advertised is Jake the Alligator Man. Purported to be a mummified half man, half alligator, he resides in a glass case against the back wall. You can buy Jake shirts, Jake cups, Jake glasses, Jake bumper stickers, and Lord only knows what else. Worth a visit. By the way, some of the info in the above description was “borrowed” from Roadside America, a most interesting web site which describes all that is weird along America’s highways. If you’re into the odd and interesting, be sure to check their web site (www.roadsideamerica.com) to research the interesting places and things which might be near your destinations.
Chen’s Chinese Restaurant - Located on the main highway at the north end of Long Beach. We had noted that there were always a lot of cars in the parking lot. The Purscell’s told us the food was good, so on Tuesday night we went there with our little group. We got dinner “A” for $9.95 a head for five people. Soup, egg rolls the size of burritos, fried rice, and three entrees. There was enough food for ten people and it was some of the best Chinese I have had in years. Jackie and I took home the leftovers and had a full meal the next day as well. Highly recommended, even though my fortune cookie had nothing in it! Not sure what the cosmic meaning of that was, but I worry a little.
Ocean Park Eagles Lodge (Aerie) - Karoke on Wednesday night. Our new friend Russ is an Eagle as well as an Elk, so we went for the Karoke last night. Started and ended early (5 - 9) but they had a lot of people there with about 20 singers in the rotation. Some pretty good, some not so much! Very inexpensive place to party - they sold big orders of french fries for a buck and wings for two bucks. The drinks were cheap too, although strangely variable in price. Jackie (Absolute rocks) and I (bourbon & 7) had several rounds and the price was never the same. First $5, then $4, then $5.25! Since the average was under $5 I didn’t complain. Dave the Karoke guy was a friend of Jim (Nofish) Anderson, an friend we met “on the road” this past winter. Nofish lives in White Salmon, Washington and we stopped to see him before we went to Long Beach. Jim shares my love of Karoke and we had gone to the White Salmon Eagles for some singing during our visit. He told us about Dave and the Ocean Park Aerie. Dave signed us in as guests. I am considering joining an Eagles Aerie since there seems to be a whole lot of them around (at least here in the Northwest) and they appear to be very active, more so than most of the Elks Lodges. Very friendly place, recommend you stop in if your in the area. Ocean Park is about ten miles North of Long Beach.
World’s Longest Beach - The only beach in Washington on which you can drive, there are a number of access roads along the peninsula. We took a little drive on it shortly after we got here, but the weather has not been conducive to spending much time on the beach. I have this thing about driving on beaches - must be some hold-over from the beach-party movies and my crush on Annette Funicello in my early teen years. We drove on several in Florida last year and again in Pismo Beach, California earlier this summer. (The only California beach you can still drive on)
Neptune Theater - The only movie theater in Long Beach, the Neptune is a two-screen box with what have got to be the most God-awful theater seats I have ever sat in. They look ordinary, but when you sit down you immediately rock back on springs to a reclining position only a few degrees short of horizontal. I felt like an Apollo astronaut preparing for take off. Very friendly staff, but the popcorn was cold and you need a cervical collar to enjoy the movie with those seats. NOT recommended!
Tomorrow Bill and Lynette arrive so I suspect that there will be some major partying to report on in a couple days. Peace out, as the rappers say!

Wet Wet Washington

We have been parked at the Pacific Holidays Resort in Long Beach, Washington, since July 15th. It has rained for six days straight with little let up. The rain is not generally very hard, just a constant drizzle. The whole coach feels slightly damp. Late this afternoon the sun finally peeked through just before sundown and right now we can see the moon out the window!!! HOORAY!
We have spent a lot of time with Ray & Anita Purscell, friends from Indio, who are staying at a park just down the road. On friday Bill & Lynette, also friends from Indio, will be arriving and staying in the same park we are in. Although we will be leaving on Sunday it will be nice to see more friends. It's been a couple months since we crossed paths with any of our Coachella Valley friends.

The History So Far

In June 2005 we sold our home in Indio, California and retired. After the sale of the house closed we moved into our new 40' Monaco Knight motorhome. We had been planning this course for about three years prior to the sale of the house and had carefully selected the coach based on what we thought we needed to be "full-timers" on the road.

We moved into the coach on June 4, 2005, and left the Coachella Valley on June 21st. Our first summer was spent in mostly in Oregon, the Dakotas, and Wyoming. Winter 2005/2006 was Florida and summer 2006 was primarily in the eastern portion of the country. We spent this last winter mostly in southern California. In April 2007 we headed for the great northwest and have been in Oregon and Washington since May.

In our first two years on the road we put 21,000 miles on the coach and another 25,000 on our Jeep touring around. Most of the first two years we were truely "on the road" only staying in one place for a week or less. We have since slowed down somewhat and are enjoying a more relaxed tour schedule, staying in most places at least two weeks.

Web Publishing At Last

After two years on the road we have finally decided to start a web log so that our family and friends can keep up with our travels. I look forward to posting entries at least every couple days.