2010 Road Trip Washington to California

I was offered the chance at a nearly all expense paid vacation and jumped at it! It isn’t often that you get to go on a trip like this. Granted, it was nothing fancy like flying to Europe to stay in a castle, but for me, this was an amazing opportunity. A few weeks back my sister called and told me that her husband and children were flying out to China and she decided not to go with them on their vacation due to allergies. That left her alone in Washington state with two weeks to kill. Her husband basically gave her vacation money to use as she wished, so she decided to offer me a road trip vacation. Basically anything within reason I wanted to do for two weeks was game. Awesome!

I flew into Seattle and timed my arrived to within an hour of when her family would be arriving to fly out for China. This made it an easy drop-off and pick-up routine. It was good to see my sister, whom I’d not seen in several years. The drive from Seattle back to her small town of Lacey was filled with chit-chat and trivia about how the area had changed since she moved there. My sister is a great tour guide. We stopped for dinner on the way home and drove by houses and businesses in the area as my sister pointed out points of interest. One that caught my eye was the Blendy Bikini Girls Coffee. About every two blocks in Washington there is a small hut in a parking lot selling expresso. Some huts are decorated to look like log cabins, some like castles. Everyone seems to want to do some cute theme. Apparently one enterprising business decided to do a bikini theme having all the hott female employees wear bikinis. This is especially effective given the girls have to lean out of the little booth window to hand off the coffee to the customers. It was quite something to see. I decided to add the venue to FourSquare (a mobile GPS check-in application). After two check-ins I managed to snag the coveted ‘mayor’ status with FourSquare!

Astoria Fog

We basically didn’t do much on Monday other than laundry and packing for the trip. Tuesday we set out traveling south for a couple hours around a bay, then headed west to the coast. The area was majestic and beautiful with leaves just beginning to turn orange with Fall colors. As we approached the coast, wisps of fog started appearing at hill tops and other photo appropriate places. We stopped for the night in Astoria where the fog decided to cover only half the bridge giving the impression that anyone there could drive across and find Peter with a throng of angels singing—it was that majestic. That evening we drove to the top of a small hill overlooking the city to the Astoria Pillar. The area was swimming in fog making the whole thing surreal. The pillar was really big and unique in that it was inscribed with patterns and pictures from the history of Astoria. Visibility was only a few feet so nothing of the city below are area was visible. I would imagine without fog the view would be amazing. Wednesday we woke, had breakfast at a funky place called Pigs and Pancakes. The name alone drew us in as a must-stop-and-see location. I think I’m getting addicted to FourSquare as I felt compelled to ‘check-in.’ After breakfast we felt that a short drive across the huge bridge was in order before leaving Astoria. I swear this is the tallest bridge I’ve ever seen. We had to drive in loops up the hillside just to get out onto the bridge. The bridge stands 350 feet in height and has 200 foot of clearance from the water to the bottom. I’m guessing some very tall ships could fit under it. We drove a little over four miles to get across and then turn around to drive back.

Highway 101

The morning was over cast with drizzling rain as we headed south along the famous 101 coast highway. We drove for several hours with no change. It was just lots of windy road covered with fog and drizzling rain. Occasionally we saw the ocean off to our right with crashing waves. We stopped briefly at Cannon Beach for ice and drinks as well as to admire the giant Haystack rock on the beach. It was quite beautiful in the drizzle and I would imagine it might be more so in a clear sunset postcard type setting. We drove most of the day heading south on the 101 until we reached Tellemook. I had never heard of the place before, but I came to understand it is well known in the Washington and Oregon area for their dairy products (primarily cheese).

Tillamook Factory

We made a stop at the Tillamook Dairy Factory where they had several gift shops, a cafeteria and ice cream parlor. We climbed the stairs to the factory viewing area to watch workers doing important stuff which reminded me of Willy Wonka minus the short people. Being in a Wonka mood, I thought ice cream was in order and I had to admit that the Tillamook ice cream cones were among the best I’d ever had. Mmmmm strawberry!