HISTORIC U.S. RT 30 along the COLUMBIA RIVER

Monday began as a sunny day!! Yipee, three in a row!! So we began a cross country trek taking what we thought might be a short cut to the Columbia River. After many times round and round and switchbacks, we finally got out of the mountains and into Troutdale OR, just in time to fill up with gas!! Thank goodness, none too soon. After our fill-up and getting onto Historic US Rt 30, we decided that it was time for a fill-up for us. So we stopped at Shirley's Tippy Canoe Restaurant for a delicious lunch. Outside the patio fence Gary found a couple friends!! No R--, they are not your ex- and her mother; just friends for Gary himself an his buddy Rick! The restaurant was very nice with a very nice patio, one that we will be sure to go back to visit. Now on to the River drive with our first stop at the Crown Point Vista House. What a view of the Gorge!! We decided to by-pass Larch Mtn. as w did not think that the visibility would be the best for the distance mountains. So on to the Falls. Gary took the long downhill walk to the first one. I was afraid of this one because of my knees. Better safe than sorry, I figured. Latourell Falls A culvert on the drive on to the next stop.

Bridal Veil Falls

Wankeena Falls, very scenic!

Now continuing east on the Highway.

Multnomah Falls, the big one!!

And we did walk up to the bridge, but did not have anyone below to take our picture.

We saw a gal park with Stark county, Ohio plates. But by the time we parked, she was not to be seen. Now on to the last one and the trip back home. Horsetail Falls

This is the one that Gary is thinking of doing a drawing from. It would be pretty!!

Now our view of Mt. Hood on the trip home. You can see that clouds did obscure the tops of the mountains at times. But beautiful!!

Hope that you enjoyed the pictures. Come back again for our next day trip. Take care!!

MET OHIO FRIENDS at COLUMBIA RIVER in OREGON

West side of Mt. Hood view on Sunday when leaving Sandy to go home. Saturday was our day at a "No" Balloon Festival in Tigard near Portland. However, after getting there and paying our fourteen dollars admission, we found out that the balloons had lifted off at 6 am. There was not even one at this location for us to look at, all that was left was the carnival!!! The television ad never mentioned the times for the balloons or that they would not be there all day!! Shame on them and you can believe that we let them know!! So we left from there, after buying pulled pork sandwiches, and checked out the garage sales in the area before going home. It was a gorgeous day and we did not want to sit around home in the shade of the forest trees all day!! We can sit around home plenty on the rainy days!! Sunday was another gorgeous day, but we had not decided what to do with our time after church. We stopped for dinner at a family restaurant in Sandy and no sooner got our food ordered when we got a phone call from our Salem OH friends, Bob and Donna. They were parked along the Columbia River near John Day Dam north of Mt. Hood. So we ate part of our meals, took the rest back to the motorhome for later, changed clothes and headed out for the River!! It is always great to meet up with friends!!
So we spent the rest of the afternoon sipping tea while sharing traveling stories. Donna has been in Oregon before, so she was sharing many ideas for sights to see. The breeze off of the River was great, but the sunshine was even better!!
Wanting to get back over the curves of Rt 35 before dark, we left earlier that we really wanted to. So we look forward to meeting up with them again. They are headed into Washington so maybe we will even run into them again there!! We never know!!

Gary was watching the River traffic and was very interested in seeing the barge and tugboat enter the lock of the John Day Dam.

You are looking at the Washington side of the Columbia River in these pictures. Bob and Donna are parked just to the left of this gravel pile along the Oregon shore. You are next looking at the Oregon side beyond I 84 and the Railroad tracks.

Going home on Rt 35 we were checking out Mt. Hood from the north side.
And Pearl, yes there are quite a few orchards on Rt 35 on the north end. I must have been asleep or reading when we traveled past these on the way going north earlier.

We also pulled into a parking lot near the ski slopes and got this angle of Mt. Hood from the south. Not too much difference, but we love the beauty of it with the snow when we are now seeing upper seventies and lower eighties at the lower elevations.
We will be going to Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood soon, but must have a good visibility day to get the most out of the trip.
Next we will show you the pictures of the Falls along Historic US 30 and the Columbia River. So stay tuned!!

SUMMER IS AROUND THE CORNER

Our spring here in Oregon has been one day after another looking just like this!! So we are very much looking for this spring to roll into summer!! This past Tuesday was just such a day where our view on returning from Sandy OR was a beautiful view of Mt. Hood!! We spent Tuesday in Silverton OR at The Silver Spur RV Park visiting friends that we met in Mesa AZ this past winter. Rosie and Claude are the Activity Workers at Silver Spur for the summer. George and Sally, also friends met in Mesa, were to arrive for a few days at Silver Spur on their way to Washington state. Rosie called us and invited us to join them for a cook-out since it was promising to be such a beautiful day. We hopped in the car and drove down to see them all and enjoy some weather like we had not had since arriving in Oregon!! While visiting and driving through Silverton we became aware of more to see in that area, so we are planning to go back another day. Thank you Rosie and Claude for a lovely day!! I must say the same to Boo also. He is the cutest little pup and so well behaved!! The week before was the Allegro Rally here in our park and we did take a couple strolls around to see all of the guests in their big rigs. Very enticing!!!

So we decided to go through the display of new Allegros and Phaetons!!

So I'm showing you just a couple pictures inside one of the units. But no, we did not trade ours in!! We did that once in Vermont in 2008 and we have spent a lot of time making changes inside our home to make it very functional for us. And even with all of the glitz we did not find any that could give us the function for common living that we have. A showcase? Yes, but not for us.

When we got back home, I took care of my water logged flowers and considered myself lucky not to have all of that debt!!

Another day's stroll through the back of our park, we got some good up hill/down hill exercise and looked over the privately owned park model homes that are summer homes for many and some stay in theirs all year long. They are all sided in a log style exterior, but are just as modern as any motor coach. They add decks and hot tubs to make them very appealing!! One of Gary's many jobs here in the park is working around these to keep the weeds at bay and the branches trimmed.

Pictures during this evening stroll did not really do these justice though. They are very nice and the sound of the Salmon River behind them is lovely!

We are still waiting for a very clear day to go up to Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood, as well as many other trips. We are expecting to have more of those kind of days soon!!

PORTLAND FESTIVAL OF ROSES PARADE

Another sunny day finally!!! It couldn't have been a better day for us as we were planning to go in to Portland for their Festival of Roses Parade. Portland is known for it's International Rose Test Garden, the oldest official continuously operated public test garden in the United States. And that will be another day's entertainment. There are many nice things to see in this city. Enjoy the pictures!!

There were at least 8 to 10 BMW's with the Queen and her court.

Wells Fargo Bank's float

We missed one of the floats that they showed on the news, but we are not sure how as we were there for the entire parade. The only thing that we could think was that they might have had a split parade route.

We had walked about four blocks from our parking place which was good, but we were definitely tired from standing. However, we decided to go on and walk to the Willamette River Walk to see all of the boats that the Navy, Army, and Coast Guard had brought down the river for display. We were not able to get close to all of them because of the crowds and the Fair that was also taking place, but we saw enough. Now for the return trip of twenty blocks!! We made it and chalked it up to good exercise!! We need to do that more often.