Friday, June 29 – TT Seaside, OR

Slept in again, I like sleeping and I think its way under-rated!   The sun is out though and I think it gets to 19C today.

We while away the morning doing laundry, cleaning, the blog, reading etc.  The noisy family next door left and another one moved in with a small trailer pretty much straight away.  As they arrived, the mother of three and two dogs kindly let me know in advance (I was sitting outside at our picnic table) they were a noisy family!  Well that puts it out there doesn’t it, at least we know what to expect!  I didn’t quite know how to respond but I will practice some come backs now I know.

They were noisy, made Kim's day as you may imagine and he spent the rest of the morning glaring at them from inside.  But after they got set up they went out for the day and haven’t come back yet at 6pm.

We ride over to the Family Clubhouse to get a chunk of free WIFI – Kim wants to update the CoPilot maps on the IPad and it will take at least a couple of hours so don’t want to use our data.  I take the laptop over and do some searching while sitting in the sun – not so effective, it’s pretty hard to see the screen in sunlight and with sunglasses on, but it’s lovely and warm. There is 60% completed jigsaw on the table inside, so I slot in a few pieces and then cycle back home to pick up a charging cable for Kim, the downloading is taking longer than first thought.

Also need to check the slow cooker, I’ve got the rest of the ribs in for dinner tonight and don’t want to cook them as much as last time.  They were much better, meat not quite falling off the bone and delish!  4 hours on high is the magic cooking time.

Watching the news and weather, we’re in the wrong State, over mid east they are experiencing temps around the 100F mark. 

June 28 – TT Seaside, OR

Cloudy this morning and we sleep in.  After breakfast we go for a ride around the camp looking for a better site. Although we could get free WIFI over near the pool and activities area, the sites are sterile with not much separating one from its neighbour.  We get talking to our current neighbours and meet their big black dog Tank, who sleeps outside and is very well behaved and decide we will stay put but will manoeuvre the coach over to the left a little more so a single sewer hose will reach.  We do this with the rooms out so it takes a bit of concise communicating because Kim can’t see me in any of the mirrors, talking suffices.

After a coffee we get on our bikes and head into town.  It’s not far and once we get to 101 we take to the footpath.  At Broadway we cross over at the lights and find the Ace Hardware and then head further down to the famed traffic roundabout where we have had our photos taken many years ago.  There are some using the beach and the sun is out now so its warmer.  This is a pretty little town, lots of restaurants and cafes, antique and gifty stores and the obligatory flower baskets.

Me at the famous Automobile Turnaround at the beach

Lifesavers keeping an eye on the swimmers - brrr!

We ride south along the 1.5 mile oceanfront promenade in front of the flash hotels for some time and get down as far as Avenue U before we find a bridge to take us back over the creek onto 101 again.  We are looking for Coast Hardware hoping they might have a sewer coupling thingy and we have come a few blocks too far.  Ace didn't have the ideal sewer option but we are thinking we won’t get one until we get to a proper RV shop like Camping World or a Walmart Supercentre etc, so we take what they do have and use some Kiwi ingenuity to make it fit.

The Salt Works, Lewis & Clark's camp. They cooked on these rocks and boiled the sea water for salt

On the way back we pass some raised vege garden beds, with a sign saying please don't pick from these gardens, they feed the people who planted them. Although their are a bunch of picked radishes laying on the ground, I assume these are for the taking but just in case I've read it wrong we don't.

These gardens feed the people who planted them!

We arrive safely back at camp, no moments even though we were riding along the bike lane on the busy 101.  The local drivers are very patient and you need to be careful where you stop as often they stop to let you go first even if you didn't want to.  I check out the outlet stores as we ride past and plan to come back here with my bike and the bike lock and a backpack to carry my parcels home!

We will spend more time looking around this weekend when the Weekend Seaside Streetcar will pick us up right here at the Park and for $5 we can ride around all day.

So come close to 7pm we bike over to the South Side Adult Clubhouse for the Naked wine tasting.  Pleased to note that everyone is fully clothed!  Kim scoffs at the plastic wine tasting glasses and can’t be bothered mixing it up with the throngs waiting for the free tastes so he rides home to watch TV.  I try the Pinot Gris and then the “Gay” which is quite a nice Rose and get talking to my new BFFS - another couple who are just a bit further down our loop and another bunch of people who work on site.  I'm back home too after about an hour of socialising, wine tasting and nibbling on cheese and pretzels.  A good day!

June 27 – TT Seaside, OR

Good morning sunshine, glad to see you have stuck around for us again today.  We are leaving this lovely South Beach State Park today, driving north along the Oregon Coast Road 101 to Seaside.

We are ready to leave early this morning as is usual for our travel days, we like to get on the road early and allow more time for the journey and/or have more time at the end of the day.  But first we have to dump and here is the issue - the sewer elbow connection got lost forever more down the sewer drain.  Not going to try and retrieve it either!  Will need a new one and tried at Walmart while we were there getting a passel of groceries to last us for the next week or so.  No joy, not at Safeway or Fred Meyers either. Oh well, there will be a place later on.

Today's drive is only 120 miles but the GPS says it will take 2 hours 45.  The road is a narrow, two opposing lane affair and is in a very lumpy bumpy condition, with lots of subsidence, I guess it gets washed away regularly.

Blue sky, rough sea, breaking waves

We need diesel so a pick up a load at Shell Lincoln City at $3.279/gallon.  The last time we spent money on diesel was June 29, nearly a whole month ago, so we did real well out of the last tank full.

Less than half the drive is beside the sea, the rest is a little inland and we pass fields of beeves, goats and sheep in the same paddock, a couple of horses and a couple of open barns with free range chickens having a lovely life.  It is also really windy we are getting blown around a bit.

Beautiful, could be driving in NZ

At one point south of Rockaway Bay we see people out setting up camera tripods and wonder.  All is revealed just a few miles on, there is a steam train huffing and a puffing, ready to leave the station.

That tunnel sure was dark, I wonder how good the flashing lights when there is a cyclist in there?

As we drive into the little town of Seaside, we see the Quality Inn we stayed at on our Harley Ride in 2006 and the Big Foot Restaurant next door we ate at.  We’ve been here before.  Further on I am happy to see some Outlet Stores AND they are just a bike ride away from TT : )  Might need to make more than one trip though depending on the quantity of parcels I accumulate.

Again, as forecast, the clouds have rolled in this afternoon and although the temp has hovered at a steady 20C all day it feels a bit cool and its dull and dreary.

We arrive at Thousand Trails Seaside a tad after 2pm and proceed to drive around the whole park to find the best site.  There are not many free ones to choose from as we want to be on the North Side where the sites have 50 amp power.  All the sites have sewer connection which is great ‘cos I have a few loads of laundry that desperately want doing.  Anyway we make do with Site 216 for now and will see if there are any better ones which may become free over the next few days.  The campground has recently installed a new WIFI service throughout most of the park - except for the tree area where we are!  The pool is indoors but there are recliners outside in the fresh air and there is also a spa and sauna.  If it gets too cold we might be found over there.

There are a few events happening here at the Park, tomorrow Naked Winery is having a wine tasting .  We saw the road sign advertising the winery along the road side and took a photo of it, it tickled my fancy – do you enjoy wine more if you are naked?

Will let you know if its any good or not!

There is a marshmallow roast on Friday night and Saturday is the Icecream & Root Beer Float Social.  Who knows if we will get to any of these but they are there.  The wine tasting is the most probable!!

June 26 - South Beach State Park, near Newport OR

Good morning sunshine, nice to see you again this morning.

We have ground squirrels here, they live in burrows rather than up trees although they will take to the trees if frightened, but as far as I can see they are not particularly timid.  They are about twice the size of tree squirrels but their tails are much less bushy.

Chubby lil ground squirrel

The coach is cleaned and polished again, a useful thing to do while pottering outside.  Forgot to mention that while we were at the FMCA Rally we had a guy who was really interested in buying the coach, he wanted to upgrade from his older Trek and loved that our Cheetah had the mural on the back as that would make his wife happy.  He lives in Washington State and was in no hurry to own it, happy to wait until we finished our trip and he even has family in OK so could pick it up from there at the end of August. However it all fell through when he realised that although the model is PDQ38 the actual overall length is 38’11” and he was in the throes of building a 39’ shed so he could do work during the winter months.  Wasn't going to fit!

Kim took himself off on a bike ride while I opted to walk some of the trails around the park.  Along the Cooper Ridge Nature Trail I came across a 9 hole golf course and the Old Jetty Trail took me parallel to the beach and just about into town but I turned back, I told Kim I would only be 45 minutes.

Evergreen Huckleberry - dark berries with a pretty red frill

Disc Golf - hardly ever see anyone playing this game

A cool wind came up around 4pm so time to head indoors.  We bought some more crossword puzzle books at Dollar Tree so the brain is getting some exercise as we travel!

Another beautiful day in Paradise!

June 25 - South Beach State Park, near Newport OR

On this day in six months’ time we will be waking to Christmas morning!!  Hope you’ve all been good so far this year!

We wake to drizzle this morning as forecast, but it promises to clear this afternoon.  We have a relaxing morning, get some ribs and BBQ sauce into the slow cooker, that’s dinner sorted and then go for a bike ride to the beach and around the camp.  We get talking to a couple of scuba divers and spy their catch.  There are seals flopping around in the channel, the water in the channel is a lovely deep green, just like at home.  Some fishing boats come back into harbour as we watch.

Impressive catch, the fish were still flopping!

Wonder how much better these guys did

Snowy Plovers are nesting here the first time in many decades so we are careful to not disturb any nests as we sightsee.

Boardwalk to the dunes and beach, those are our bikes

Beach just like home

Different aspect of the Yaquina Bay bridge, Newport - we have seen it from all sides now.

By the time we return from our bike ride and we’ve probably ridden a few miles, the sun is out and it is warm, so its out with the sunscreen, kindle and the recliner and I am happy for another hour or so.

The Ribs were really tasty but cooked way too long, the meat had already fallen off the bones leaving them already clean.  Next time (and we have some left) I will just cook for the recommended four hours on high.

Come evening the campground is covered by a low wispy ceiling of smoke from the many campfires, might have one ourselves tomorrow.

Sunday June 24 - to South Beach State Park, near Newport OR

Good morning sunshine! Moving on today so no dilly dallying in our campsite!  We are ready to go by about 9am but first  pop in to say g'bye to J&G and they invite us to stop in at their lake side property on our way to South Beach State Park.  Check in at the SP is from 4pm and being Sunday we are probably better to arrive later in the afternoon rather than earlier when our site might not be vacated, so we have a whole day to enjoy first.

So we drive to Pony Mall North Bend, less than a mile away, where there is a Ross (my fave), Dollar Tree and Safeway all within the same parking space.  I have a nice relaxing shop and I escape with just a couple of items from Ross, many from Dollar Tree and we don’t even bother with Safeway in the end, we have not used much of our food supplies while at the Rally.

Just after we crossed the McCulloough bridge, still in North Bend, we need to brake to avoid a mid size deer which wants to cross the highway in front of us.  They are so graceful, this one leaps over the road barrier and skedaddles into the greenery.

J&G live on a beautiful lakeside property about 10 miles south of Florence.  We thought we knew the way, we’ve been by there once before with L&L, but after a bit of a ‘walk about’ (read getting lost)  we eventually arrive.  There is parking for us immediately outside their property amongst the boat trailers. as the Westlake launch ramp is right at the end of their property.

Relaxing in the sun

We sit out on their deck sometimes manouvring our chairs into the shade as necessary.  Around the 2pm the threatening fog comes over and it gets a tad cooler.  Just about time to move on anyway, we have another hour or so drive ahead of us.

We slot in behind another Safari Cheetah with a mural on the back, it makes a nice change to follow a pretty picture, now we know what people experience following us.

Nice mural!

Nicer mural - ours!!

One wannabe suicide jockey in a ute overtakes them on double yellow lines with minimal visibility and I don’t know how but he manages to live another day, dang it they are still in the gene pool.  We don’t see much of this in the US, we find most Americans are super polite and super patient although we do go out of our way to move over and let them pass.  At the next town we get in front of the Safari so have another viewpoint for the next 10 miles or so.

The sea fog rolls in over the coast and the temp drops!

We arrive at South Beach SP and enjoy a super quick check-in, might have something to do with we are parked in the through lane rather than the check in lane, but we have our paperwork real quick and mosie on to find out site F33.

The fog has cleared and come back again while we have been here and its already 4pm so we don’t spend much time outdoors,

Not so many photos today we have too many juicy bugs on the windshield!

June 23 – Mill Hotel & Casino, Coos Bay OR 97459

Our last full day here and it is a beauty!  We are up early enough to attend the Coffee and Pastries session from 7-8.30am this morning.  We have been trying to get here every morning since we arrived.

Beautiful morning, view from the boardwalk around the Casino/Hotel

At 9am we want to go see the second Audiology Seminar concentrating on Hearing Loss, Tinnitus & Hearing Aids.  Same presenter as yesterday and he does an excellent job and answers lots of questions.  Immediately after that is the Swap Meet, we didn’t see anything we had to have and didn’t spend any money, then we have a free afternoon. So over to the laundry with a load of washing, there is nowhere to sit outside over there so I come back and relax at home with the timer on my watch set.  I bring it all back wet to put in our dryer.

Joy phones up and asks did we want to go to Ace Hardware, Kim had mentioned earlier he wanted to call into a hardware store for a couple of things, namely a joiner to repair the pinhole leak in our expanding hose, our second hose has failed.  We’ve already bought a replacement hose, the third, so I am picking the fix will be perfect and we’ll end up with two working hoses, thanks Murphy!  It was lovely of them to offer and by the time we got back it was time to head down for the early dinner. We have seen a steady stream of motorhomes pack up and leave today so it is nowhere as busy as it has been.  We guess, correctly, that nobody will care particularly that we have gone to the early dinner with J&G rather than our later sitting.  But dinner at 4.30pm takes a bit of getting my head around, it feels a bit like it should be afternoon tea!  However, the catered buffet dinner consisted of Coffee Crusted Braised Beef Tips with Dark Porter Demi, Herb Crushed Yukon Gold Potatoes, brown gravy, salads and all the trimmings and it was pretty good!

The Dining tent, plenty big enough to serve 400-500 at a time

The entertainment tonight is a Hypnotist, Tammy Harris Barton – hope I don’t get turned into a chicken!  Her show starts at 8pm but at 7.30 they are drawing a number of raffles so we will wander back over to the dining tent to check that out.

Glad we went, the show was hilarious!  Thanks FMCA, you put on a good rally for us.

June 22 – Mill Hotel & Casino, Coos Bay OR 97459

Bugger, we missed the coffee and pastries again today but we did make it to the first seminar at 9am ‘Audiology – I Can Hear Just Fine’ which was really interesting.

However we do make the Icecream Social again, I think the flavour is actually vanilla bean, really nice.  Only after I finish do I see they had a thick Caramel Sauce to go with, oh well I am sure I didn’t need it!

We do a couple more seminars, the boys go to Shocks & Suspension and I drag Joy, somewhat unwillingly, to the Holding Tank Solutions one – I am sure this presenter is the same we had at the last rally selling the same concoction.  It sounds good but you shouldn’t use it with any other cleaners which could destroy the bug doing all the good odour eliminating and sludge killing work.

Joy and Gary have invited us for a late lunch at Luigi’s, their all-time favourite ‘hole in the wall’ Italian sandwich bar in Coos Bay.  The building is unprepossessing, painted bright green and the décor was plastic chic - kinda how you would expect an American diner to be, but have to say the food was fabulous – even though we chose the Roast Beef Grinder without Garbage (vegetables) to J&G’s horror, rather than the deli meat sandwich with onions and garlic butter which they like.

Late lunch at Luigi's with Gary and Joy

Grinder with Garbage

We have time for a wee rest before the wine walk starts.  Once a month on a Friday night between 4.30pm and 7.30pm retailers open their doors and offer complimentary wine tastings.  We paid $12 and got an etched FMCA wine glass, we were taken by school bus to Coos Bay village and were supplied generous tastings at each of the venues on the list which we cared to call at.  There are 22 retailers within say six blocks, all within flat easy walking distance.  Even mattress shops, clothing and antique stores where spilt red wine could have consequences, were participating.  There were no problems as far as we could see, everyone was having a great time.  There was no hard sell by the retailers and the proceeds go to different charities each month.  Brilliant, I would love to see this at home, imagine meandering through Petone tasting wine and shopping of a sunny evening!

Yay - Lois and my fave Chardonnay offerred for tastings!

Even the Coos County Republican Committee hosted tastings and have to say it was a much nicer environment than the Democratic Party's offering down the road!

We get back to the motorhome and it is still light,  the boys call it quits and the girls go and donate some $ to the Casino for an hour or so.  One of us came out with winnings and one of us came out with memories : )

June 21 – Mill Hotel & Casino, Coos Bay OR 97459

Had a better sleep, in fact so good we missed out on the Coffee and Pastries between 7.00 and 8.30 this morning - oh well another day tomorrow.  Cereal and fresh berries is much healthier anyway!

We do catch the Opening Ceremonies though and Kim checks out the Tire Safety Tips for Protecting Your Investment Seminar at 10am, followed by the How to get Better Mileage & Engine Reliability but he only stayed here a few minutes as it was all about electronics and replacing your dash. So he joins me in the Cascadia Subduction Zone which is all about earthquakes in this area which is particularly prone to the nasty ones, ie the sort that moves the plate from out in the sea to in under the land.  The 2011 Christchurch quakes features in his presentation - we are famous!

We get outside and the sun is shining (yay!) and it is time to partake of the Icecream Social, this is special locally produced Umpqua icecream, French Vanilla by the taste, served with frozen strawberries.  I am coming back again for more tomorrow but will give the berries a miss and go solo with the icecream.  No queues for this, they had bowls of icecream ready to go.

We check out the vendors and purchase some new outdoor step rugs and some special silicone polish for the coach – they didn’t have the awesome stuff we got at the last rally but this new type seems pretty good too.

We head back home and I think it will be a good time to go over and use the RV Park showers (I need to wash my hair properly, you know with multiple  rinses).  The showers are open to the FMCA campers too, all several hundred of us!  I thought I would be waiting in a queue forever but when I get there all but one shower was free so I luxuriated - and they were very nice clean modern bathrooms too.

Sat outside in the sun for a half hour reading but was rudely brought back to the present when my kindle dropped on my lap!  Maybe last night was not a good a sleep as I thought.

Joy and Gary come up for an early HH.  They had selected the first sitting for dinner so need to be there for 4.30pm, we chose the late sitting and ours starts at 6.15pm.

 

We catch a trolley over together and go check out the special way the salmon is cooked for those of us who chose salmon tonight.  They open the fish out, thread it onto timber rods and secure it with sticks and cantilever it over a fire pit burning with fragrant wood.  What you see here is enough salmon for one quarter of the salmon meals tonight.  Hope there’s enough for everyone else!

Basted with huckleberry - smelt delicious

The full menu is:  Traditional Salmon (cooked at the Fire Pit)

or

Chicken with Huckleberry Buerre Blanc with Huckleberry & Pickled Red Onion Relish

Served with Tossed Green Salads, Wild Rice with Hazelnuts and Cranberries, Fry Bread with Huckleberry Butter.  Followed by Berry Cobbler and Whipped Cream.

Fry Bread with Huckleberry Butter - yum.  Salad is health though!

Some Oregon trivia for you:

Oregon contains more than 5,900 registered campsites along with 230 state parks and 13 national forests.  There are more than 6,000 lakes and 112,000 miles of rivers and streams.

Nearly half of Oregon’s total area is forested – close to 30 million acres.

There are currently 17 ghost towns in Oregon.

The pear is Oregon’s state fruit, ranking as the top selling tree fruit crop.

The Oregon hazelnut is the state’s official nut and Oregon grows 99% of the entire US commercial crop.

There are more than 700 vineyards planted on about 13,700 acres. Oregon produces more than 40 different varietals of wine grapes.

The population of Oregon is only 3.4 million, with 1.5 million living in the Portland area.  Oregon is the 10^th largest state in the union.

June 20 – Mill Hotel & Casino, Coos Bay OR 97459

OMG - it was a very noisy night, some of those big trucks just thunder by and right outside our bedroom window!  No trains though and on closer inspection see these tracks have not been used for quite a while. Hope to sleep better tonight now we are used to it.

It must have rained overnight but morning eventually arrives with grey cloud cover.  We found out that good friends of L&L are parked right at the other end of our row.  Joy pops in this morning to say Hi and we arrange to get together later for HH before the Food Truck dinner.

We catch the complimentary casino shuttle into down town Coos Bay for the afternoon.  Glad we came today, there is a Farmers Market and it's a good one too.  Kim liked the fudge!

We walk a few blocks around the village and see quite a few murals.  This one of Steve Prefontaine is interesting.  Steve was born here in Coos Bay in 1951 and became one of America's greatest runners, once holding the U.S. record in every long-distance event from the 2,000 meters to the 10,000 meters. He narrowly missed a medal at the 1972 Munich Olympics.  In 1975 Steve died tragically in a car crash, aged just 24.

Steve Prefontaine - son of Coos Bay

A wobbly AND a mural in the background - two for one!

We pop into the Coos Bay Visitors Centre, the History Museum, Art Museum and North Bend Visitors Centre (thank you Mr Shuttle driver)  to get our poker card stamped so we can have a poker hand dealt on Saturday - high hands and low hands win prizes.

We finish up with a walk along the boardwalk which mirrors some of the boat ride we took yesterday.

Coos Bay Boardwalk

Beautiful hanging baskets everywhere, they grow well here

Then we are back home to download the photos and have a bit of a rest. Joy and Gary come up to ours for HH but it is a quick one as we don't want to miss out on the Food Trucks, which will be our dinner tonight.. The menus and eventually the food was really very good, but the wait was l o n g! 

The live music tonight is performed byThe Young Bucs, a 9 piece band doing 50’s and 60’s Doo Wop Music, they were great - bought the CD - Can’t Stop Lookin’ Back at the Oldies - to enjoy it all over again later.

Back to the coach for a not too late a night, we have a big day tomorrow as the Rally starts for real and there are a few seminars and vendors we want to check out etc.

June 19 – Mill Hotel & Casino, Coos Bay OR 97459

Yay, the sun is back this morning and it’s going to get to 19C.  It’s a travel day so we are enthused and on the road by 9.10am with a brief stop off at the park dump station first.  We need empty holding tanks and a full water tank for our stay at the Mill Hotel & Casino in Coos Bay for the FMCA Rally.

Lovely scenic drive

We drive through the little towns of Reedsport, Lakeside and then across the impressive Conde B. McCullough Memorial Bridge (one of the most recognisable icons) into North Bend.  This bridge was part of the federally funded Coast Bridges Project, a plan in 1934-1936 to build five bridges across coastal waterways in order to complete the Oregon Coast Highway.

Conde B. McCullough Memorial Bridge

We stop off at Walmart here before driving another 5 minutes to Coos Bay where we find the Mill Hotel & Casino easily due to all the FMCA road signs.  Slight site malfunction, our “Will Call” package is not updated to include the powered site we only recently arranged but it easily fixed by a ride in the golf cart back to the Hotel Registration where we swap our pink ‘General’ parking sign for a yellow ‘Electric ‘ parking sign.  The golf cart waits for me and takes me back to the coach and we drive back up the roadway to the powered sites.  We start the next line of coaches, so we are next to railway lines running adjacent to Hwy101 the main highway north and south.  Oh well, we probably won’t be in the coach much anyway.  (Haven't heard a train yet, just traffic noise).

We are at the very end on the right hand side, next to the main highway

We get our slides out straight away so the next coach can be positioned far enough away from us, get our the power cable as they haven’t run the temporary power here yet, then off to the yurt to pick up our Welcome Kit.  When we get back we have neighbours - Jon and Nancy. They are very friendly and we chat for a while and meet their German Shepherd.  They invite us to share their outdoor area which is smoother than ours and not facing onto the highway and offer to take us shopping if we wish.  Of course I wish!

We are booked on the 3pm Betty Kay Harbour Cruise so catch a trolley to the Casino and find out where it boards and if we need tickets etc.  We have an hour or so to fill so have a look around the ‘coach for sale’ lot.  It’s not busy so we get to have a good look in almost all the coaches and campers.  However the sales people are present and a bit hard to dodge.

The good ship Betty Kay

We get on the Betty Kay and start our tour.  First we head directly north alongside the wharves toward the long high bridge we crossed to get into North Bend.  The logs piled up on the wharves remind us of Wellington Port.  The wharves and piers seem to be in disrepair along this stretch.

Can smell the cut wood, reminds us of home

Under the Conde B. McCullough Memorial Bridge, build in 1936

Of course Kim is up talking to the skipper and we learn a new rhyme to remind us what the rules are for entering harbours here in the US.  Red Right Return – keep red to your right coming back into harbour!  The boat has lots of trick electronics including radar overlay on the chart plotter, AIS etc.  Kim is in his element.  Unfortunately the cruise did not have any commentary but we learnt a lot by chatting to the skipper.

We pass by some ‘town wharves’, a bit like Picton and there are a couple of larger yachts moored.  Their coastguard boat is Kim’s envy, there is a machine gun on the bow!

The barrel of the gun is clearly visible!  How would that look on Shariba?

We get back 90 minutes later but we have been standing for all that time so ready for a sit down before the 5pm Hotdog Bash.  We rock over there about 5.45pm and the tables are full so no queues for the food and they haven't run out.  Our dinner is a fresh roll, quite a nice hotdog with condiments to suit (mustard, ketchup, sweet relish), baked beans, a small bag of chippies and a small bag of bite size cookies.  They had live music in the food tent but the ambient noise was too loud and it was hard to hear our new BFFs at the table.  Such a shame L&L can't be with us.

We have lots of reading material to get through to work out what seminars and events we want to attend while we are here and to get the lay of the land.  I think tomorrow I want to get the trolley into town and have a look around there.  The rally proper doesn’t really kick off until Thursday.

BTW - our new water pump is really quiet!!

Monday, June 18 – TT South Jetty, Florence OR 97439

No sun this morning, high cloud and it gets to about 18C by late afternoon.  Get a couple of loads of laundry underway and take myself off for a fast walk, Kim is coming on a slow walk later, he is reading his book for now.  I leave the RV Park and turn left down the road to the Oregon Dunes Recreation Area where there are a couple of OHV’s having lots of fun on the steep sand hills, reminiscent of our 4WD days in the Foxton sand dunes! Enjoyed the walk although I had to use the shoulder along the roadside but it was wide enough to do so safely.  And I managed to close two rings on my watch already, just the standing one to go!

Wonder what is on the other side?

There were only the two when I got there but more and more came

Took a short cut in the RV Park through this lovely little trail on the way back home, could be in NZ!

Backtracking a bit, as I was leaving for my walk I passed the time of day with a couple looking for a site, just around the corner from us, when I got back an hour and a half later they were trying to get into the site they had chosen but had so far had only managed to rip the driver side front guard off their motorhome in the attempt.  And they still hadn’t got into it the site and it didn’t look like they could go either in or out now and were also blocking the roadway.  Nothing I could do so left them to it - not a very happy day for them : (

We need to put the bikes away for tomorrow but first take them for a ride to the Adults Centre, which is up a steep hill, more so when you are biking than walking – huff puff!  We are going to have a Pool Tournament, Kim and I.  The score is: I would have won he first round if I didn’t go in off the black but Kim convincingly won the second and third - he had his eye in by then!  The sun has come out by about 3pm so we race downhill (phew) back to the motorhome to catch some rays.

Good game to play on an overcast day and you want to be inside!

Kim goes to see if he can help the couple (we passed them again on our  bike ride, they have managed to set up in the site opposite the problematic one).  Bill and his wife are full timers and are here for three weeks so will get someone to come and look at the panel repairs. You have to feel for them, but I guess that's motorhoming!

I looked up RV Trader to get an idea of the asking prices for similar motorhomes - Monaco Safari Cheetahs today, 2004 Safari’s range from $59k to $88k. We are going to put up the for sale signs at the Rally.  Might have to put a pin in a number and that will be the asking price.

I think I can hear a woodpecker but for the life of me I can’t find him!

Sunday, June 17 - TT South Jetty, Florence OR 97439

Happy Fathers Day to all the Dad’s out there.  It’s a lot warmer this morning, already a sunshiney 20C by the time we surface.

Today’s entertainment is the ‘Fathers Day Yard Sale’ here at the resort - we get quite excited about what goodies we might find that we absolutely have to have.  However, we are sadly disappointed, we are not really the ideal captive audience for used toddler clothing (from the enterprising local who set up a stall right outside the activity centre) or crocheted toilet roll holders (from the campers down the road with too much time on their hands).  On the upside we didn’t spend any money!

Another afternoon by the pool is the order of the day but we’ve only been there about 40 minutes before a cool fog rolls in obscuring the sun.  OK, it’s not so warm now and the two little girls in the pool have particularly raucous voices and someone in the Jacuzzi is playing their music rather loudly so we leave them all to it and head back to the coach. It’s about time for some food anyway.

Before the fog rolls in

Instead of taking our bikes out on the road to find the ATVs we check it out on Allstays and there are indeed high 385’ sand dunes between us and the sea.

Sand Dunes Frontier (www.sanddunesfrontier.com) offer single seat quads (from 90cc to 400cc), 2 seat Side by Sides (up to 800cc), 4 seat Side by Sides (up to 1,000cc), Sand Rails and King Size Dune Buggy rides maybe carrying 10-12 passengers.  By the sounds of things this weekend they are doing a ‘roaring’ trade!

Lots more comings and goings today and we notice a lot of the campers gaze beseechingly at the sky with their phones in hand to try and find the elusive direction of the satellite for their TV fix.  New guy across the road has spent at least 20 minutes outside looking skywards, hope he doesn't get a crick in his neck.

Kim is watching a program called Charge on TV, it fades in and out on occasion, but it is a western so he can put up with that.

He has surreptitiously drained our grey water (only from dish water and hand washing) onto the ground outside which drains into the bush, so I’ve done a load of laundry - yay we have clean clothes again.  Tank is still pretty empty so will do towels and sheets tomorrow, our last day here before we move on to the Rally at Coos Bay, we won't have sewer there either.