On the move again!

We moved again!

Garibaldi, Oregon!  At a campground right on the bay!

As I sit here writing this, it is so peaceful and pretty – I’m looking out at the water, listening to the sea gulls fly by and the sound of the navigational beacon, giving boats an idea of the location of the harbor (because there is so much fog here!)

We arrived in Garibaldi after a BEAUTIFUL drive on Highway 101 on the coast of Oregon – SO much to see on the drive (I felt bad for Leonard that he had to keep two hands on the wheel and two eyes on the road!)

One of the highlights we are all excited about is the TILLAMOOK CHEESE FACTORY!  After unhooking the trailers and getting set up (AGAIN!) we headed off to see what it was all about!

WOW! The place is huge and there is so much to see!

Upon entering the building, there are stairs that go up to a viewing area so you can watch the entire process of cheese making!  We did a self-guided tour of this process and it is amazing – SO much cheese!  I wondered when I stared down at the process, “do all those workers still like cheese after doing this day in and day out?”

Here are some photos and videos for you to see – I’d try to explain the process, but I can’t!  It’s very complicated and too hard to understand, let alone try to explain!

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After taking this tour, we all wanted some cheese!!!  AND GUESS WHAT?? Right as you leave that part of the building, you pass a cheese tasting area before heading downstairs!  There were three kinds of cheese to sample (all wrapped so no dirty fingers were on the pieces of cheese – that’s important!)

Here are the things we purchased!

And then I treated myself to a sweatshirt because it is SO me – I LOVE ice cream, and one of my favorite ice creams is Tillamook chocolate chip!!! It’s the best!  Every bite has so many little dark chocolate chips in it – YUMMMMMMM!!!!  So this shirt was made for me!

I will wear it with pride!

Of course we HAD to get some ice cream!  It’s Tillamook Cheese and ICE CREAM factory!  I’d forego cheese for the ice cream!  Bob and Bobbi had a flight, which was three flavors – that way they got a little of several things!  They had German Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Peanut Butter, and White Chocolate Raspberry!

Leonard and I each got two scoops of two different flavors (I don’t share ice cream well!) – he got Espresso Chip and Strawberry.  I got Chocolate Peanut Butter and my favorite…CHOCOLATE CHIP!!  It was delicious – that was our dinner for today!

Touring the factory and seeing the gift shop, sampling the delicious cheese, and ending with ice cream was great!  Who knows…we may go back tomorrow!

When we got back to the campground we walked to the beach, which is pretty much in our backyard here!

As we walked, we noticed LOTS and LOTS of blackberry bushes!  We were so excited, so we grabbed a bag from the trailer and loaded up the berries!!  Tomorrow we will try making some stovetop jam!  Hopefully it will turn out – how bad can it be?

Our next “adventure” was a train ride on the Oregon Scenic Railway, which we boarded right here at our campground!  We love train rides, and this one was nice and short – taking us into the town of Rockaway Beach for a quick walk-around and then hopping back on the train to our campground.

ENJOY THIS VIDEO OF THE TRAIN!

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After the train ride, guess where we went?  Back to Tillamook!  We couldn’t figure out where to have lunch (sometimes it’s hard to pick a place by looking at pictures on the phone!) so we knew Tillamook served food other than cheese and ice cream!  So, we had lunch and dessert! No surprise that we had CHEESE curds and grilled CHEESE!

After another great day, we took bowls and headed back down the beach path to look for more berries!  We hit the mother load!  Bob and Bobbi filled two gallon bags and Leonard and I filled two big bowls!

After such a fun day, we had a BEAUTIFUL moon over looking our campground!  We are blessed!

Tomorrow we will make some stovetop jam – it won’t be REAL jam because we have no pectin, but we have sugar and lemon juice and LOTS of berries, so we will see what we can come up with – more to come!

We made our way to our next destination –  CANNON BEACH!  We were exhausted when we arrived because it was a whole hour drive! Haha – the RV park in Cannon Beach was great and every site was surrounded by trees!  So peaceful again!

  

I have to report that the jam making went perfectly!!!  It was a little bit of a mess with the purple color all over the trailer (or so it seemed) but may I say, it turned out GREAT – it is delicious! We spread some on an English muffin toasted perfectly with butter and it was yummy!  So glad we did it!

One of the things we had on our schedule to do was to visit Haystack Rock – we wondered what it would look like and as we pulled up to our campground, it was obvious!  We could see it from the highway and it is perfectly named!

After setting up the trailer, we headed over to Cannon Beach to see the rock, and WOW!  The beach was gorgeous and Haystack Rock is huge!   It was a perfect day as far as the weather, and we enjoyed walking on the beach with lots of others who had the same idea!  As we approached the rock, we noticed little tide pools of water, and as we walked over to them, we were amazed at what we saw!  Sea stars everywhere!  (Starfish) – I’ve seen starfish before, but not this big and not these unusual colors!

Also in the tide pools were sea anemones – and lots of mussel shells!  So pretty!

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Here are some photos and videos of Haystack Rock and the beach around it! Enjoy!

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After Haystack Rock, we headed to Fort Stevens State Park to see part of a shipwreck of the Peter Iredale, which ran aground in a heavy storm on October 25 1906!!!!!!  Leonard had seen this months ago when we were planning the trip, and has wanted to see it ever since!  It is amazing that part of the ship is STILL there one hundred and twenty years later!

Another beautiful and fun day on the Oregon coast!  We feel so blessed to be here, to have amazing weather, to see such amazing things, and just to enjoy the opportunity to do this!

Next on the list…

Astoria, Oregon!  After a good night’s sleep (as always in the trailer!) we headed to Astoria.  It is the oldest city in Oregon, and the first permanent American settlement west of the Rocky Mountains!  It is also the northernmost coastal city in Oregon!

What a beautiful coastal town it is!  We went to the Astoria Column, which is a tower overlooking the mouth of the Columbia River and was built in 1926 – it stands 125 tall, and has 164 step spiral staircase leading up to the top and an external observation deck!  I wanted to walk the steps but have had some knee issues over the past months, so I thought better about it and chose to enjoy it from the bottom – Leonard and Bob walked the steps and said the view was spectacular!

 

Here is a short  view of the walk back down!

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We spent the rest of the day exploring Astoria, and it was so fun!  We saw Pier 39, the largest and oldest waterfront building in Astoria, which hosts the Hanthorn Cannery museum, which was the old Bumble Bee tuna/salmon cannery, established in 1875!  We had a DELICIOUS cup of coffee at the Coffee Girl shop, which was where the cannery workers would take a coffee break! We had a great lunch at Fort George Brewery and Public House.   Found another coffee shop to buy coffee beans – it even had a vending machine outside with bags of coffee beans!!! Something we had never seen! Then we walked to the waterfront to watch and listen to some lively sea lions!  What a fun day!

HERE ARE THE SEA LIONS TALKING TO EACH OTHER!

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On our way back to the campground, we all said today was one of the best days we have had on this trip!  It’s great to make such great memories with friends, travel to amazing parts of our wonderful country, see God’s creation every day, and just enjoy this life we have been given!

Thanks as always for coming along with us – tomorrow we head to inland Oregon!  There’s not any more of the Oregon coast to see – we’ve seen it all!

Can’t wait to see what’s ahead!  Stay tuned!

UNTIL NEXT TIME…