Today ended in Disappointment.
September 27th
Having enjoyed a relaxed pace yesterday, we were up early and raring to get started on the fun packed day that lay ahead. There was a touch of frost about on this bright and crispy morning and where the sun cast it's rays, it created a mist. After breakfast and a short walk by the river we drove further into the forest to the Sol Duc waterfall trail parking lot. It was about 8:30am and although there were a couple of cars in the parking lot, it was so peaceful you could hear a pin drop. The walk through the woods was wonderful, almost mystical as you looked through the misty sun rays into shadows of thick growth. It was quite an easy trail and it wasn't long before we heard the sound of the Falls in the distance, we passed an old hut and crossed a bridge to find the small falls nestled in the forest.
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We spent a little time admiring them and enjoying the solitude before returning to the RV to make our way back to Hwy101. Our next 'Port of call' was the Hoh rain forest where we wanted to walk through the 'Hall of Mosses'. We drove through the small town of Forks and over the Bogachiel river before turning off onto the Upper Hoh road, which partly followed the Hoh river into the rain forest and giving nice views along the way. We arrived at the Hoh rain forest centre a little before Noon.
River Hoh.
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Hall of Mosses.
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After walking the Trail, which was lovely, we sat in the RV and enjoyed a nice lunch before traveling back to 101 once more, it was about 18miles each way to the Hoh rain forest from Hwy101. The 101 then makes it's way to the coast and right there at the point it reaches the coast is Ruby Beach, with easy parking access and an easy trail down to the beach. This place makes a great place to stop and enjoy the coast, with lovely views and waves breaking onto the large rock stacks. Climbing over large driftwood and paddling in Cedar creek which drains into the Pacific here, all adds to the fun. You can opt to try and cross the creek on make shift bridges created by the driftwood if you fancy your chances ! [Yep, got wet socks !]
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Continuing down the coast we went through the town of Queets where 101 turns inland again to Lake Quinault where we took a small diversion into the little town and checked out the pretty lake.
Lake Quinault.
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We topped up with gas in Hoquiam where we had to take a small diversion over a narrow bridge due to road works and then crossed the Chehalis river at Aberdeen. We then drove through the town of Raymond, where the side walks were full of metal sculptures of all shapes and sizes from one end of town to the other, and through South bend. Lot's of little fishing boats moored up and coming back up the Willapa river after a day at sea. The sun was starting to set as we drove through the Willapa National Wildlife refuge to the Long beach peninsular where we headed into town on the 103.
Today was Simon and Louise's wedding anniversary and Louise had chosen 'The Pickled Fish' restaurant in Long beach to celebrate, it couldn't have been any nicer. We arrived at last light and parked on the beach and admired the sunset colours, there were families still on the beach with fires going which just added to the romance of it. The restaurant was located upstairs with big windows looking out over the beach to the ocean. They had a great range of cocktails, the food and service was amazing and to top it all of, they had a live 3 piece band performing, very nice indeed !
Long beach.
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After a wonderful evening we had a few miles left to cover to get to our destination for the night, our campground in Cape Disappointment State park. [Well I did say at the start we ended in Disappointment]
Todays miles 279. Total 2249 miles
Louise reserach par excellant
Louise certainly does a super-duper job researching and finding those little memorable spots.
Really enjoying the commentary on this trip.
and I really liked the custom, decorated $2 bill donated to Fat Smitty's!
Mark
How about the explanation then !
We drove through there George, no Tulips were humped ! Having done a little research I found this explanation.
Quote:
The name Humptulips was the name of a band of the Chehalis tribe who lived in the area. The name comes from a local Native American language, meaning 'hard to pole',
Perhaps I should mention that it refers to 'Poling' their canoes along the Humptulip river.
Dave.
No need to be linear herein
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Harry Kline
I'm sorry for joining the thread so late. There are several items l wanted to comment on, but they are out of context now.
Harry, you can bring comments forward from earlier posts -- do you know how to do that? (Hint: You use the "reply with Quote" function -- but only grab just enough of the previous post to make sense. We'd much rather have the commentary -- it doesn't have to be linear!
Mark
View From Sherrard Point Overlook
Dave,
I posted four of the five of the pictures in RTA PhotoShare. you can view them near the bottom of the screen at Most Recent. I have Mt St Helens, too, but it is elsewhere in My Albums, so I'll attempt to link it here.
Harry
(Moderator edit: for photos you don't have to use the URL format -- use the image format!
http://www.roadtripamerica.com/photo..._St_Helens.JPG
(Much easier for readers, if you just grab the images and stick them in here -- very tough to find images in most recent posted -- what you see in most recent will likely be different than anyone else -- those pages are created dynamically based on algorithms!)
More from the Oregon coast.
September 29th.
Jessie M Honeyman SP is just north of Dunes City and unsurprisingly, the sand dunes are it's main attraction but also has 2 freshwater lakes. It is separated from the ocean by 2 miles of dunes. So this morning after getting ready for the day ahead, we went hiking around the area. It was tough going at times with steep climbs in soft fine sand, but it was very rewarding.
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We spent a couple of hours 'playing' in the sand before heading back to the RV, drinking a coffee and hitting the highway once again. We headed through Gardiner and alongside the Umpqua river before crossing over it towards Winchester Bay and down to Hauser. We then stopped at the David Dewett Veteran memorial which is right by the highway and alongside the river. It has nice views of Sand Dunes in one direction and the McCullough Memorial bridge that spans Coo's Bay in the other. The bridge itself is a wonderful piece of architecture and spans for 5,305ft over the bay, the longest in the State when built in 1936 and was a bit of a master class in engineering, as the busy waterway had to be kept open throughout construction.
Here you can see the bridge in the background.
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It was time to continue south and make our way across Coos Bay to North Bend where there were huge ships in dock stacked full of lumber.
McCullough Memorial bridge.
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By the time we got to Bandon we were getting hungry so we stopped at the Station Restaurant for lunch, Omelette and hash browns which were huge and very tasty ! Bandon is a nice Oceanside town with shops and beaches and located where the Coquille river pours into the Pacific. We head into town and drive down the Bandon beach loop drive which offers nice views of the Coquille river lighthouse and Coquille Bay.
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As we headed back to Hwy101 south we enjoyed many great coastal views as we drove through Humbug mountain and Sisters Rock SP's and over the Rogue river into Gold beach. Our next stop was at Kissing rock and it's lovely sandy beach just south of town near Hunters Creek. Along this stretch there had been miles of cloud developing out to sea which took on a rather distinctive shape of a huge wave, in Tsunami territory !
'Tsunami cloud' at Kissing Rock.
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We then stopped at Myers Beach north near the Pistol River followed by Arch rock on Windy corner and probably the nicest of all, Natural Bridges.
Arch rock.
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Natural bridges.
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Back on the road we headed through Brookings and crossed the State line back into California and on to our campground for the night, the Elk country RV resort south of Orick, arriving after dark once again. A nice 'home' cooked meal and a couple of beers followed and we were ready for bed. The Oregon coast was quite amazing but try and do much more than a couple of hundred miles a day means you will miss out on a lot of great places, we only just skimmed the surface.
Todays miles 230. Total 2687 miles.
The Golden Gate. Not quite to plan !
October 1st.
Another beautiful morning welcomed us so we took a walk around Redwood river resort and down to the Eel river that ran below before breakfast and then it was back on the road heading south on the Redwood Highway. As we got to Leggett I really wanted to take CA1 down the coast, but also understood long ago that this wasn't possible as our time on the road at this point was running out. So we continued south on 101 through Redwood valley and past rolling hillside and small Wineries all the way to Corte Madera where we stopped at the Cheesecake factory as instructed by our food Guru, Louise. It was located in the Corte Madera shopping village that had a collection of stores and was very busy which then became a problem to park up. We stopped in a waiting area designed for delivery lorries and thought we would have to get take away but the staff in the Cheesecake factory were very helpful and called security to confirm we could park there for a while. It's not usually my 'type of place' but I enjoyed it, the place was quite lavish and the food was very nice.
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As we left we caught views of San Quentin State prison across the bay and it wasn't long before we saw Bay Bridge and the city of San Francisco in the distance from Mill Valley. We turned off 101 through the town of Sausalito and made our way to Vista point on the north end of the Golden Gate bridge.
San Francisco from Sausalito.
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The parking at Vista point was packed so we continued up the Marin Headlands on Conzelman road as planned. We had arrived expecting parking problems, especially in an RV and it was no surprise that the parking lot at Battery Spencer was also full, we had banked on getting lucky as the turn around of parking spaces was quite quick. As we continued further up the hill our luck arrived, another RV had just vacated a big space in a pull out on the road side and we slotted straight into it. We had great views of the bridge and it was only a short walk out to Battery Spencer and best of all, there was no fog !!
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We enjoyed many views with aircraft, pleasure boats and ships going over and under the bridge before making our way up to the small roundabout on top of the hill to turn around and come down again and at last get to drive across the Golden Gate bridge. We had pre paid the toll to cross by 5pm and it was a little after 4pm that we started to merge onto the bridge. I was hoping to be just ahead of rush hour getting through SF, but that was all about to change !! The traffic was moving slowly on the bridge as we merged our way on to the bridge, but it was moving. Having merged we were trundling along when there was a big bang that made me jump and then a car bounced off my front wheel, The bang was the sound of my side mirror being struck by the car roof and sent flying forwards. We stopped on the bridge and the lad, a young Russian who had just collected his rental car said that a car had forced him over into our lane and he had nowhere else to go. He seemed to be going faster than everything else around him and it seemed that he was trying to accelerate through a gap that wasn't there rather than backing off. There seemed no need to stand on the bridge, so I suggested we go to the other end and find somewhere to park and exchange details while trying to hide how I really felt. It was tough, with an estimated half a million miles without an accident, a delay I could do without and the fact that I was probably going to lose my damage deposit until it was sorted going through my head. It didn't get any better at the other end when he stepped out of the car with his American friend who had then changed their story to I had merged into them and should have given way. A sheriff was called and came and took statements and it was well past 5pm when we finally got back on the road and the traffic had built up quite a bit, delaying us even more.
We cut over to the coast and headed down the Great Highway to CA1 and through Pacifica and El Granada where we had another unexpected delay just south of town. This one was welcome though and by choice, we saw activity on the water and yep, we were once again blessed by Whales close in shore. I took a small turning down to Miramar beach and we watched them for a while and instantly the mood lightened.
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We continued south on the Cabrillo Highway through Half Moon bay and arrived at Pigeon Point Lighthouse just as the sun was setting.
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It was time to move on to our destination for the night, Henry Cowell Redwoods State park near Felton. We had the option of going down to Santa Cruz and head back north or cut across the hills that included roads named 'Ice cream Grade' which sounded challenging, I love a challenge ! The Ice cream grade turned out to be just that with narrow winding sections and switchbacks and warning signs that states the pass is not suitable for trucks. It sure was a work out in the dark especially as it seemed to be used as the Locals short cut, or should I say race track !! We made it to the campground around 8:30pm feeling pretty beat but still able to take all the good from the day before tucking into Chowder and bread followed by the Cheesecake we had failed to eat after a big lunch at the Cheese cake factory. Yummy !!
Footnote. With only a small amount of damage to the wheel hub cover following the accident, Cruise America did not hold my deposit on return. I had photographic evidence and I have heard no more about the incident.
Todays mileage 270. Total 3135 miles.
All good things must come to an end.
Keith, you trying to stop this coming to an end?
Guess like myself, you have been taking a virtual roadtrip with them. Time to plan your next trip mate.
Lifey
