Ocean Adventure, Day 5

Many, oh very many years ago, I visited Cape Disappointment State Park with my Dad.  We had been charter fishing out of Ilwaco for salmon and after we'd done our "work" for the day (read: Dad fished, I was ill) we filled the afternoon hours with a visit to the north jetty along the Columbia River, which is in the park.  I remember walking on the rocks with Dad and how he told me about the Columbia and how rivers silted up and building the jetties  helped keep the river in a more narrow channel and how it would scour out the channel with the force of the flowing water.

What Dad and I didn't do was visit the North Head lighthouse and take the scenic loop road through the park.  Nola and I had a good time exploring there yesterday.

The North Head lighthouse is in a beautiful spot.  But, really, can you think of a lighthouse that isn't?  It was 69 steps to the top.  The view south to the river as wonderful.

Flocks of pelicans were passing by, every few minutes, as well as a glut of gulls.

The cliffs are steep and the surf crashes into the rocks at the bottom in a most pleasing way.  It is truly a beautiful place.

This is the Cape Disappointment lighthouse, also within the park boundaries.  There is also a very interesting interpretive center.  Lewis and Clark finally reached the Pacific here on their expedition with the Corps of Discovery, in 1805.  This state park is a part of the larger Lewis and Clark National Historical Park that spans both sides of the Columbia, in both Washington and Oregon.  It is the newest of our national parks.

To cap off a lovely day, another stunning sunset.

Ocean Adventure, Day 4

On Saturday, in Ilwaco, there is a very nice market at the Port of Ilwaco.  There were some veggie vendors, some with berries that looked totally delicious and made me want to make jam and lots of arts and crafts.  It's a nice selection.  You can get something to eat, either from a tent or from one of the restaurants located along the way.  There was even a chowder truck!

I love to photograph artist's palettes and Don Nisbett kindly allowed me to get a shot of his.  Don is a local Northwest artist.  I love that palette!

Don Nesbitt in his gallery/studio

There was a lovely little independent bookstore tucked in among the shops and restaurants, called Time Enough Books.  I loved the Mark Twain quote they have painted on a wall in the shop.  Sadly, it is so very true.  I found some books I had to have, of course.  What are you reading right now?

Ilwaco is a true, working port and there are many charter companies available to take you out for some salmon fishing or sturgeon, is that is your preference.  (Not mine!  No sturgeon for this one.  Hate the stuff!)

We had a truly fabulous dinner at Jimella & Nanci's Market Cafe in near-by Klipson Beach.  We'd been told that was the place that all foodies must visit and we were not led astray.  I had the pan fried oysters and they were just about the best plate of oysters I have ever had, and certainly the prettiest.

The oysters were crunchy on the outside and like hot custard on the inside, just the way I love them.  I bought a couple of jars of their jam to take home, one huckleberry and one Bing cherry.  Doesn't that sound good?

The sunset wasn't bad, either!

Ocean Adventure, Day 3

We visited Loomis Lake State Park and took the trail to the beach.  It wound through a little bit of forest and then opened up to grassland and dunes, then the beach proper.  The whole walk was, maybe, three minutes.  A blustery day, with rain spitting at us occasionally, left us with a big stretch of completely deserted sand.

Except for the birds!  There were large flocks of pelicans flying into the wind, down the surf.  And father out, some sort of seabird in large flocks.  Frankly, my eyes are good enough to figure out what they were.

Lots of pelicans!

There is a big arch leading to the main beach access in Long Beach that proclaims the peninsula the "world's longest beach."  I'm not sure that the statement is not hyperbole, but it is a massively long stretch of sand, that's for sure!  And about the last stretch of sand that  you can still drive parts of in Washington State.

This is a beautiful place, especially when you are all alone with all that water and all that sand.  This part of the coast is called the "graveyard of the Pacific" and it's easy to see why.  There have been a  phenomenal number of shipwrecks here, for as long as man has been sailing by.  (Okay, okay, some of you Dear Readers will say, "Gee, not that long, really, in the course of human history."  I know.  I admit it.)

Miss Velvet-Eyed Doe keeps stopping by for her close-ups.  She is not the least bit afraid of me.  In fact, someone in this condo building was throwing something down into the grass for her to eat the other evening.  We do not feed the animals.  We photograph them but we do not feed them.

There is plenty of good, appropriate eats around for this doe and her friends.

Ocean Adventure, Day 2

We had our first whole day on the Long Beach peninsula, and we filled it to the brim with wandering, shopping, dining, chatting and lots and lots of laughing.  The first big laugh of the day was when I spotted the Frantic Fred's sign.  I misread it to read "Fabulous Fred's," (which it may well be, but I haven't been inside so I can't really say....).  I have a very dear friend named Fred who is fabulous but not frantic so the sign brought him to mind. He always makes me laugh, so it was a nice way to start out the day.

The whole little town, all the little towns, seem to be full of lush, colorful flower baskets.  This one with the very hot colors appealed especially.

We had our breakfast nosh at the local bakery....which has way too many goodies from which to choose.  It was very hard to be good.

Nonie posing for her photo

Lunch was chowder, salad and garlic bread.  You have to eat chowder at the ocean, don't you think? I kind of wished I hadn't as the chowder wasn't that good.  The clams were local and fresh and delish, but the chowder no so much.

Dinner was at The Dunes Restaurant.  I had oysters and they were perfectly cooked and quite tasty.  So tasty in fact that I forgot to take a photo!

Me and my friend Sharron Huffman

I went to the opening of Sharron Huffman's show at the Bay Avenue Gallery in Ocean Park last night.  I will be taking a class from Sharron next week and will have much more to say about her and her wonderful art (nature printing and encaustic) later.  Many of Sharron's friends call her Little Bit.  You can certainly see why as I am not a tall woman myself....

This lovely lady is a local resident.  I keep spotting her out the front window in the sea grass just before the dunes.  She is not afraid of me, or anyone else.  She does like to pose for a photo, too.

Sunset last night was at 9 PM exactly and it was beautiful.

A Week at the Ocean

Nonie and I have arrived at our rental in Long Beach, Washington.  We'll be here for one week.  We found a lovely two bedroom condo on Vacation Rentals by Owner (VRBO) that is just a short walk through the dunes and sea grass to the beach.  The photos were taken from our little deck this evening after we go settled in.

If you have never tried VRBO I can highly recommend it.  This is the fourth time I've found vacation rental property on the site and I have never been anything but pleased with the rentals.  The descriptions are always correct and the photos truly representative.  It's an easy way to find a place for a holiday.  And, no, I don't get a kick back from them!

Tomorrow we will begin to explore the Long Beach peninsula.  There are several towns along this stretch of (mostly) sand that runs north-south along the coastline of southern Washington State, just north of the mouth of the mighty Columbia River.  We are staying in Long Beach proper, but there is also Ilwaco, Seaview, Ocean Park and  Oysterville.  State parks abound, also, and then there is the lure of the miles of sandy beach and the mesmerizing surf rolling in from the Pacific.

I haven't been here for, oh, almost thirty years!  The last time, I was here with my family, camping.  I remember it well because my husband and I were sleeping in the double bed at the front of the travel trailer we owned at the time.  Our son, maybe 3 or 4 years old, was sleeping in a twin bunk right above us.  At about O dark thirty my son rolled off the bunk above, fell straight down and landed on the small of my back while I was sound asleep.  He didn't even wake up!  I did.  And it hurt!  I've (almost) forgiven him.

I'll post more about my adventures here as the week goes by.  Stay tuned.

Recent Sightings

This Western Kingbird is nesting in my husband's ham radio tower at the cabin in Eastern Washington. Neither of us knew what sort of birdie it was until I looked it up.  Reading the sentence, "Both species are aggressive toward intruders near their nests, often attacking much larger birds,"* I knew I'd found the right one in the bird book.  The parents kept squawking and flying about, throwing hissy fits, whenever I approached my car.  Apparently I had parked well within their territory.  It was, I promise  you, inadvertent.  I really take no pleasure in torturing birds!

This little fellow is often to be found on the front porch of my cabin in Western Washington, in the foothills of the Cascade mountains.  I do know know if it is a salamander, a newt or (maybe) a skink.  I don't really think it's a skink as they have blue tails, if I remember correctly.  The book I need to look up this fellow is, of course, at the cabin....

If you, dear Reader, might know the identity of this little fellow, please let me know!

And then we come to this fellow.....anyone who knows me will know that this fellow, curled up under my doormat, is not my favorite of all of God's creatures.  In fact, it is right at the top of the list of my least favorite creatures.

Let me say, in my defense, that having such a healthy and plump garter snake living in my garden is a good thing.  I know that.  I know it eats all sorts of things I would rather not have in my garden (or in my house, for that matter!).  But on the porch?  Two days in a row?  Sunning itself in the late afternoon, just where I am bound to throw open the door and start to bound outside only to come to a painfully immediate stop when the snake is spotted?  Really?

He is quite a pretty snake, if you like that sort of thing  Again, the book I need to identify the actual species of garter snake is, alas, on the other side to the porch...I think it's a common garter snake, but I could very easily be wrong.

And back to the east side of the state, we have this lovely quail, who was standing on the railing at my husband's cabin the other morning, shrieking at me.  I am still not clear what I was supposed to be doing for it, or not doing for it.  I was inside, it was outside.....go figure.  Very elegant profile, however.  I love their topknots!

*Birds of the Puget Sound Region by Bob Morse, Tom Aversa, and Hal Opperman, published by the R. W. Morse Company, Olympia, Washington, 2003.

And, yes, the hydrangeas are coming along

Alas, the peonies are truly only a lovely memory now, as even the large planting of pale pink ones at the cabin are finished for this year.  But as I mentioned in a recent post, they hydrangeas are coming along nicely!

Since it is only early July, we haven't had any real summer weather yet.  Oh, a day here and an afternoon there, but in the Pacific Northwest, it's been Junuary as usual.

We traditionally never really have summer begin until after the 4th of July.  We might just get lucky this year....maybe summer will start on the FIFTH?  Wouldn't that be a treat?

In the meantime,  while I'm waiting for the start of summer, I'm just going to enjoy how the hydrangeas brighten up even the darkest corner of the garden.