Thanksgiving Road Trip, better late then never

I can’t believe it is January 2nd and I have not written about the fantastic road trip we took after Thanksgiving. It was such a great trip, it is worthy of a late write up. After spending Thanksgiving with my parents, sister, daughter and a house load of kids we headed out on a rainy Friday morning for the first leg of trip. It was a rather unremarkable and routine down I-5 with a stop at Camping World for a lunch and supplies. We arrived at the Linfield College parking lot in time for a nice dinner of Costco roasted chicken and a bottle of Pinot Gris from Duck Pond. After a good nights rest we spent Saturday tailgating and celebrating a Linfield football playoff victory. Sunday morning we got up to bright sunshine and a crisp fall day in the Willamette valley. We headed out of McMinnville with plans to stop at a few wineries, but the plan was thwarted because it was Sunday and the wineries open later on Sunday. Keep that in mind if you are a wine taster. Plan a leisurely brunch then hit the wineries. On the northwest edge of town we headed north on highway 47, a delightful road that takes you through the farms and the hamlets of Carlton, Yamhill and Gaston; great wine stops if you hit them the time of day right. 47 takes you to the historic old town of Forest Grove. Forest Grove is a college town, home to Pacific College. At Forest Grove we headed northwest on highway 8, a winding narrow, yet scenic road though valleys, along a river with lots of old farmhouses and barns. Birds were a plenty in this area. I had to pay careful attention to the road, but Chrystal saw lots of eagles. Highway 8 merges with highway 6 and we began a winding trip through the mountains and back down through coastal valleys, before arriving at Tillamook. This highway was very scenic with plenty of pull outs to enjoy the views. Tillamook is a great town with plenty to do. Two stops I highly recommend are Blue Herron and the Tillamook Cheese factory. These were timely for us because it was lunch time. At Blue Herron, you can sample cheeses, and dips, then top it of with a little wine tasting. We purchased a few nice wines to bring home for the holidays, including a delightful cran-raspberry dessert wine. There is a nice big RV lot and picnic area at Tillamook Cheese; so this was a perfect lunch stop after a flight of wine at Blue Herron. The self guided tour of the plant is fun and very educational. Like all good tours it ends in the sample area and store. We left here stocked with cheese and ice cream. After a slow and enjoyable drive up 101, we stopped in Astoria for the night at the KOA. This was a great off season find; all campsites were $25 for the winter. We were having issues with our coach batteries, so we kicked back and enjoyed the evening with a couple of steaks on the barbie and some cold beers while I tried to figure out my battery situation. End result; good beer and steak, new coach batteries needed. Monday morning we got up to another day of sunshine for a short trip over to Cape Disappointment State Park. The park was not crowded and we got a great spot near the ocean. You could not ask for better late fall weather. Sun shined all day and we had a spectacular sunset. We enjoyed a couple of hours walking on the beach with no one on the beach but us.

When we went down to watch the sunset there was only two other people on the beach.

We did get an important reminder about putting trash away at night. While sitting in the RV watching a movie we were interrupted by a racket outside. I opened the door and shined my flash light on three very fat raccoons trying to get my recycle container open. The lid was tight fitting so they were pushing it around trying to break in. I chased them away and stowed the bin in a compartment. They did appear to be eating very well of the garbage around the park. Tuesday we headed inland to catch I-5 in Olympia for the always boring last leg home. We arrived home well rested from a long holiday weekend.