Back out on the open road!

Day 13 / 14 – Manzanita and Gold Beach, OR

I’ve been off the road for the past 5 or so days, holed up in Seattle, WA. This is where the rest of the family flew in to meet me. I now have companions for the next 2 weeks or so!

After the crazy year we’ve all been through, it was great to catch up with friends and family – sans masks – and enjoy some down-time in the emerald city. Seattle is as lovely as ever, but after spending a few days driving around in the Seattle traffic, I am not sure how they do it!

It’s always fun playing tourist in your old home town, and I pulled my iPhone out on many occasions to snap some shots. One of the highlights of our time in Seattle was visiting The Spheres, part of Amazon’s Seattle campus.

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We departed Seattle on Monday morning to start the third phase of this trip – the Oregon Coast! Our journey south would take us down Highway 101, through Astoria, OR, where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean, through the seaside community of Cannon Beach, to Manzanita, OR. We spent the night camping along the Pacific Ocean at Nehalem State Park – (the featured image on this post). Oregon beaches in June can be unpredictable but luck was on our side and we had a lovely afternoon/evening. It was great to be with the whole family in camp, sitting around the fire and enjoying some of our favorite wines – Willamette Valley Pinot Noirs!!

We were back in the Jeep on Tuesday, heading to our main destination for the week down in Gold Beach – along the southern Oregon coast. The house we rented sits on 70+ acres on the bluffs overlooking the pacific. The coast has a lot of rock features down this way and the views from our deck and private beach didn’t disappoint! After an early morning getting some work down, the early afternoon was spent beach combing climbing around the rocks.

We will be here until Friday at which point we head south over the border into California where we meet up with some friends in the Coastal Redwood Forest. More soon!