Today was a day of excursion. We took off to see what was in the area on some of the black roads you see on the map. The town of Riddle is only a few miles away from Tri City and only a small community but on a rail road and there is a large lumber camp where they process logs from the area. We saw several trucks hauling logs to the mill and others hauling lumber away as well as rail road cars loaded with lumber ready for resale.

A lot of the logs go into veneer and others into building materials and smaller logs go for chip board or wafer board as some call it. Everything is used even the sawdust which goes into particle board.

As we progressed in our trip we got more into the mountains and the road followed the rail road and Cow Creek. It was obvious that the road followed trails made many years ago by hunters and then later gold miners, etc. The road got down until it was only about one and a half lanes wide. No markings on the road or along the road as far as road signs were concerned. The only signs you would see would be for the rail road when you crossed it.

We followed Cow Creek on Cow Creek road for many miles. We found one turn off where a town was many years ago called West Fork. There was a tablet with photos and an explaination of the town but we saw no evidence of any buildings left. We went up the road a few miles following West Fork Creek but turned around and came back to Cow Creek Road and headed toward the town of Glendale.

Glendale is not much of a town, other than another big lumber company with lots of logs, train cars, etc. Lots of logs piled up waiting to be processed.

It was after lunch time and we found a small deli and had lunch. I had a 1/4lb cheese burger, FF Mushrooms and Evelyn had a regular burger and fries all for $5.46. A real deal on some tasty food. It was at the Pickers Deli. One cook and one order at a time.

After we ate we were back pretty close to I5 so we headed back north to Canyonville. Shortly after we got on I5 we went up a pretty good grade and when we got to the top it said 6% grade next 8 miles. We were still going down when we got off at Canyonville. If we go back south when we leave we will have that 8 mile grade to climb as well as others farther down south. Not sure how we will go from here. Will have to study the maps a bit to see how we will go.

It was warm again today and supposed to be in the low 90's tomorrow before cooling off for the week end with some rain possible.

Did not do much today, changed a tail lamp bulb that had burned out. Checked all of the other clearance lights to make sure they were all working as necessary.

Evelyn went to town to see the local Chiropractor as she has been having trouble with her hip and back. Came back feeling much better and is to go back on Friday. Maybe back the first of the week if necessary.

Tomorrow we will take a trip, maybe south toward the California border and look things over. Not sure just where we will go but I will tell tomorrow on my blog. Also have some new photos to look at.

It was a lot warmer this morning here in Myrtle Creek, OR. It has been cool the last few days in Washington with heat on every morning.

It has been in the 80's here for several days and according to the weather forecast it will stay in the 80's for the next week.

Not a lot going on today, just a trip to the 7 Feathers to pick up a UPS package and then on to town to get some hardware and some groceries.

Back at the ranch, we decided to change spaces turning around so we could see the mountains out the dining window. That way we can watch the clouds and fog rising up from the valley.

As you go down the interstate you see roads up in the hills but you do not see any connecting roads to get up there. Surely there are some, but it is difficult to find them from the main highways. There are few highways in this area due to the mountains and the towns are even fewer and farther between.

There are not a lot of people due to the rugged countryside and the big operations seem to be in lumber, from logging to all of the other facets of the business.

The photos show the Columbia River and the mountains showing the narrow area for the rail road and the interstate on the Oregon side. You can also see a rail road tunnel in the first photo.

Our night along the Columbia River went well, only a few trains, some on either side of the river. More trains this morning after daylight.

This is a beautiful area, especially as the sun comes up against the mountains and the reflection on the water.

As we were leaving, I looked up and there was Mt. Hood as clear as can be. The last time we were in this area, a week or so ago, we could not even see it for the clouds.

We traveled east on I84 toward Portland and took I205 around the city south to I5 and then south to Myrtle Creek to the Tri City campground where we will be for a week or so while we get our mail and other items that will come via UPS, etc.

Not sure what we will do with all of our time, but tomorrow will be a day or rest for me as we drove a little over 300 miles today.

We need to spend some time working on the tow bar safety cables and replace some of the parts. I think we can find everything at a local hardware to make the repairs. I will take time to clean up the towbar and lubricate the slides and make sure all is working as it should before we leave again.


Our photos are of the sun bathed mountains across the river from our campsite.

Mt. Hood, which was shining brightly in the sunshine. And the old rail road bridge that raises in the middle to let the larger boats through. It appears to have been there a long time and apparently still in use.

I do not know of any other place that the train can cross the river. There is rail road tracks on both the Oregon and the Washington sides of the river.

We did not see much traffic on the river as far as freight was concerned, possibly due to the downturn in the economy and maybe just an off season for what they move in the barges.

Our photos for the prior blog.

Lock and dam at John Day on the Columbia River










Sun setting on mountains behind motor home.




Wind turbines on hills above Columbia River Gorge

We left the school this morning about 9am and headed west toward US395 to go south toward Oregon. We had a little head wind and a bit from the south but not very much.

We traveled down US 395 until we found the fruit market we stopped at on the way up and got some good things to eat. Even some delicious red raspberries, maybe my favorite of all the berries. They had piles of corn, buy one dozen and get another dozen free. We saw thousands of acres of sweet corn in the field and being trucked into the processing plant, even on Sunday. I guess you have to process it when it is ready.

We are currently parked alongside the Columbia River just below the John Day Dam and Locks. We have not actually seen the locks in operation but did see one tug and barge going up river just above the dam and one that had just cleared the locks as we pulled in to our parking spot alongside the river.

There is a rail road just above us between us and I84 and a rail road across the river in Washington as well as sr14 that goes along the north side of the Columbia River Gorge. We have had several trains go through, so it might be an interesting night to sleep. I do not expect much traffic on the river until tomorrow.

Across the river on the top of the hills/mountains thee are hundreds of wind turbines that are making good use of the wind coming up the river gorge.

Tomorrow we will work our way to Portland and down I5

We were up a bit early this morning and inside at about 8am. The public was not allowed in until 9am, so we had time to uncover and finish getting ready to go to work.

Business started before the doors opened from some of the vendors. At 9 the public came in and things were a bit slow for the first half hour then we got busy and were very busy for the next hour and a half or so and then it was all over. By noon, it was only a dribble here and there. The inside vendors started to pack up and by 2pm or so most had left the building.

We were packing up slowly and by 3 we were out and putting things away in the motor home. I do not know why they advertise the hours from 9am to 5pm when everyone is gone by 3pm.

All in all, we had a pretty good day and were happy with the outcome. Just a bit far to come for a one day hamfest.

The photo is of one of the new buildings at the Evergreen Air Museum. It is not open as of yet and there are plans on other buildings to be built on the areas that are currently in a vinyard.

It is back toward Oregon tomorrow and the Canyonville area for a few days.

Not a lot going on today, just waiting on the school to let out and the place ready to set up for the hamfest tomorrow.

We moved from vamp Walmart about 5pm stopping at Fred Meyer Grocery to fill up the motor home with fuel and then on to the school.

It did not take long to get set up. The hamfest is being held in the cafeteria area, so it will be interesting as most of the vendors will have round tables with attached seating to sell from. They brought in regular 8 ft. tables for the commercial vendors so we have our normal setup. It will be interesting to see how the public works through the maze of round tables to see all that is for sale.

Our photos are from the museum that houses the Spruce Goose. This is a neat old motor cycle and side car. I could not find the name of it however I was unable to see the other side.

The bus appears to be early 20's maybe earlier but beautifully done in nice hard wood.

We left the campground before noon today and headed east to the Walmart where we will spend the night. It is located a couple of miles from the school, the location of the hamfest.

We are parked way out from the store in a remote part of the lot where we are out of the normal traffic pattern so it should be relatively quiet tonight.

Tomorrow night we will be at the school in the parking lot after setting up ready to do business on Saturday morning.

Shortly after we arrived another ham knocked on the door and he was also here waiting to set up tomorrow evening. He mentioned another hamfest the end of October south of here in Oregon. I have sent them an e-mail and maybe we will work that hamfest as well before we head south toward warmer weather.

Yesterday as we came into town we came down a long hill. The sign said 5% for the next 2 miles. Today as I drove down to town I recorded a drop in altitude of 600 feet in that 2 miles.

Our photo is of one of the old bridges that used to carry the traffic across some of the low areas as you come down into the town. Your really go downtown to the heart of Spokane and then on east into Spokane valley.

This morning it was a bit cool, in the 40's, so the heater felt pretty good. We needed to be in town for some things and to look over where we were going to be the next few days.

We checked out the school where the hamfest will be on Saturday. There is a large walmart close by, so that is where we will spend tomorrow night and then we will go to the school on Friday evening to set up and spend the night in the school lot.

We ate lunch at Panda Express and as we were leaving, a van pulled around us with an antenna on the roof. It looked like a triband vertical. It parked very close to our
van, so I went to the fellow driving and struck up a conversation. He was not an amateur, but had a scanner in the van and that was what the antenna was for. I mentioned that it looked like a tri band antenna and he said he had just bought some parts at Radio Shack and put them together to get better reception. I suggested he come to the hamfest on Saturday and he could buy an antenna designed expressly for his scanner as well as all kinds of other equipment. He was quite interested and indicated he would be there. It will be interesting to see if he actually shows up.

Our photos are of our very nice campground showing some of the other units here as well as the secluded areas where they are parked.

We got an early start from camp Walmart this morning. We had over 200 miles to get to Spokane for the hamfest on Saturday. The traffic was light and we were already on the correct highway, so things went well. We drove about 4 miles to the next town and mailed some items and filled up with fuel as it was a bit less expensive than in Washington.

As we traveled north we went across the Columbia River and got so see some interesting bridges as well as another of the many dams on the river that generate power and supply irrigation for the surrounding areas.


As we were getting into Spokane, we saw a sign that indicated camping ahead, so we pulled off and saw a nice sign for the Overland Station camp ground. He headed that way and when we got there, what we say was a dilapidated building and a group of junky old trailers, etc. Not a place we wanted to stay.

As we turned toward the Overland Station, we noticed another RV sign that went the other way to the Ponderosa Pines RV Resort. It is very nice and definitely a resort. A bit pricey but very nice. We will stay here tonight and tomorrow night and then it will be off to the hamfest site not very far away.

There is a lot of this part of Washington that looks like it is just a desolate desert. Not much of anything growing after you get away from the river. Apparently not much rainfall on the eastern side of the mountains. there are areas that is irrigated and the crops look good.

We found one area where there was a lot of corn growing with the help of irrigation and there were processing plants that was taking the corn in the husk by the truckload. I saw two loads of white onions and one semi load of potatoes going somewhere, to be processed. So apparently they grow a lot of items where they can get water to them.

We did see a lot of pasture land and finally saw some cows, maybe they have moved them to other areas, but we did not see very many.

We left our parking spot on the Corps of Engineers facility on the banks of the Columbia River. Late last evening, just at dark, a couple of vehicles drove in and parked at the far end of the lot. We could see them out with flashlights but could not really tell what they were doing. This morning it was obvious they were setting up a tent to sleep in.

After they ate some breakfast, they were busy getting their wind surfing boards and sails assembled to go wind surfing.


The other fellow in the motor home was already up and out on the water sailing in all directions, with the wind and against the wind. Not being a sailor, I do not understand how you can sail against the wind but I have seen it done.

We only drove a short distance today to the town of Hermiston, OR. We are at camp Walmart for the night and will go on to Spokane, WA where we will hole up for a few days until we go to the location of the Hamfest on Friday to set up. We will spend the night at the school where we will be working on Saturday.

Our photos are of our camping area of last night as well as the wind surfer and the road back out to civilization and I84.

We spent last night in Lafayette, OR at the Sleepy Hollow RV park. Not much of a park, but it had everything we needed and was secure. It was next to a rail road track, but no activity, at least while we were there.

It rained for a while before dark, but I did not hear it rain any during the night.

This morning we headed north east on 99W toward Portland where we picked up I5. North to the junction of I84 and east along the south side of the Columbia River Gorge. The river is within sight most of the time and you can see the traffic and the trains on the north side of the river which is in the state of Washington. There is also a rail road track on the Oregon side of the river that was busy as well.

Even though it was a Sunday morning, there was a lot of traffic on I5 as well as I84. We drove east past the Dalles and pulled off the highway long enough to tour the town. It is a very old river town with all of the shops and eateries you might expect.

Us30 runs along with I84 and takes off at several different areas to make a detour into some of the smaller towns. There are areas along the interstate where you can see the old road bed and it is still in use in other areas higher up the mountains.

Evelyn found Corps of Engineers facilities all along the highway and we past one at one of the river dam areas which really looked nice, all paved and convenient for boon docking. The next one was at mm151. So we pulled off and turned toward the river and the road immediately turned to a gravel washboard road. Not being able to turn around, we continued on knowing that at worst we would have to unhook the van and back both units out to the pavement where we could turn around.

A little farther down we found the facility. It has two pit toilets as well as a level gravel parking area big enough to turn around with a great view of the river, the tugs with their barges going up and down the river as well as the trains and traffic on the Washington state side.

Knowing this was the big night for football, we started the generator turned on the tv and sure enough we got some 12 stations and were able to watch the Colts beat the Giants from out in the middle of nowhere. I would estimate we are about 100 miles from Portland, OR so where the signals are coming from, I have no idea.

Our photos are of downtown Portland and the Tram that goes up to the Westhills overlooking the city as well as white capped Mt. Hood. The third photo is our Corps of engineers parking facility along the Columbia River. There are two other units here and it appears they have been here for a few days. There is a 14 day limit on stays at all COE facilities.

We only drove about 50 miles or so today. We thought we would go farther after we visited the Evergreen Air Museum in McMinnville, OR, but it did not happen.

We spent most of the day in the museum. If you are ever in the area be sure to visit the museum. This is one of the largest buildings I have ever been in. It is big enough to house the 8 motored Spruce Goose. It was the vision of Howard Hughes and was built out of wood veneer for strength and durability. It has 8 engines and only flew one time, but it flew. It was not supposed to be flown, only taxi on water to see how it handled.
It was a big news item and everyone was there to see if the largest plane ever built would be seaworthy enough to fly. It made one pass in front of the viewing stand and then turned around and came back. It turned around again and as it passed the stand it was nearing its speed to go airborn and Hughes just held it wide open until it cleared the water and was airborn for a short period of time. It was brought back and put in a hanger on the bay.

I have no idea what it would have cost today, but a lot of money.

The top photo is a model of the Spruce Goose. You can not get the real one in a photo. You would have to be outside the building and then it would be hard to see the whole plane. It is huge.

The second photo is an expermental plane, one of a kind. There are several of these in the museum.

The third photo is of the Ford Tri Motor passenger airplane. They had some of these that flew over the grand Canyon many years ago. You can see some of the control cables outside the plane that controls the flight of the plane, The baggage area is under the wings in drop down hatches. It looks a bit crude, but it flew and was a part of the advancement of aviation.

We also went to the I-Max and saw the Legends of Flight in 3D. A great film and it is the first 3D film I have seen and being nearly blind in one eye, I did not think I would be able to see it well, but I think I got the idea when a sharp object was at the end of my nose and you duck things that come flying at you. All in all, a very enjoyable film. The other option was the Hubble in 3D.

It was raining when we got up this morning and it rained most of the day with a few dry spells. We drove north to Tillamook and to Cape Meares. 101 is a narrow crooked and rough in spots road. Most of what we drove today would be hard in a big rig, however we saw several along the way.

The views along 101 are beautiful of the ocean and some of the huge rocks out in the water. We saw several fishermen fishing at the Salmon river as well as many out in the bays as well as a large boat out in the ocean. We saw some boats tending crab pots along the shore. On the shore, in the small towns are homes as high up the hills as you can get them. I am not sure how they get there by vehicle, but it looks difficult.

I had a malfunction with the computer and our photos we took today. Maybe better called operator error. I was deleting some photos that were not good and somehow the whole days photos dissapeared. I looked in the recycle bin and found them and restored them, but now I can not find them. I do not know where to look, other than Picassa where they are normally saved.

Anyway, they were not really good due to the rain and clouds being below us in some areas, but they were better than nothing. If I find them, I will share them and also, I will not delete them from the camera until I an sure I have everything I want.

We visited the Killamook Cheese factory and took the tour, ate lunch and had some ice cream, which was all delicious. We watched them make cheese, package it in 40lb chunks and send it to the warehouse to age and then watched it come out of the warehouse where it was cut and packaged in shrink wrap in various sizes and boxed ready for shipment.

The creamery is supplied by 20 dairys in the area and have been in business since 1909. It is certainly an impressive operation and make a lot of very tasty cheese.

Tomorrow it is off to McMinnville and the museum of the Spruce Goose.

As we were leaving the Dry Camping area at the Mill Casino in North Bay, OR we found out where all of the logs were going. We had seen load after load on the highway for a long ways.

They were being taken to North Bend to be put on a ship and taken somewhere across the Pacific Ocean. We saw one ship that looked like a container ship that was being loaded with logs higher than the sides and they were still loading it. I am not sure how many it can hold, but a lot. Maybe more than a thousand truckloads, who knows.

We had seen areas that had been clear cut for several days and apparently many of them are being shipped overseas. We did see several processing mills that were making plywood and chip board, etc. but why are they sending them abroad?


As we worked our way north to Lincoln City we followed the ocean quite closely, many times just over the edge of the water high on the rocks where we could see the huge waves coming in and crashing against the rocks or breaking over the sandy beaches. It is difficult to believe that it does this all day, all night, every day for ever. Where does it all come from and why? Just some of the mysteries of the universe that the common man does not understand.

We are in Lincoln City at the Devils Lake RV park. We stopped at the Chinook Winds Casino and they did not have any RV parking as they were getting ready for a huge car show this week end and were using the RV areas for the car show. We were sent up the road to the Chinook RV Park but they were full and they suggested Devils Lake. We called and they had one space we could have for two nights. We will leave the motor home here tomorrow and take the van to the Tillamook Creamery for a tour and some of their ice cream that is so popular in the area.

It will probably be too late tomorrow when we get back to go anywhere, so we will just wait until Saturday and head for McMinnville, OR.

Our photos are of the ocean and some of 101 and a house set high on a hill overlooking the ocean. How tough would it be to have to live in a place like that?

We were a little late getting away as there was some work to do and then get the rig ready for the road.

We headed up 99 to Myrtle Creek to mail the mail, hook up the van and then get on I5 and head north toward Roseburg. We picked up sr42 west toward the town of Bandon on the Pacific Coast Highway, 101.

We ate our lunch and headed north on 101 toward the town of North Bend, just north of CoosBay. The campground where we had planned on staying was full as was most of the others in the area.

We returned to 101 and the Mill Casino that has a huge campground. They were not full, pull thrus were $39.50 and water front were $49.50. The casino has a dry camping area next door to the RV park that is free. So, that is where we are. When it is dark, it really does not make much difference if you are on the water or in the free section.

Tomorrow we will head north on 101 to Lincoln City to the Chinook Winds Casino and then on Friday we will go to the Tillemook Creamery and cheese factory for a tour.


Our photos are across sr 42 through the mountains to the coast. It was obvious that there had been a lot of the mountains logged off and replanted as some had small trees, maybe 3 or 4 years old, other areas they were maybe 15 years old and others appeared to be full grown, maybe 12 to 15 inches in diameter and thick as hair on a dogs back.

A great example of a renewable resource. You see log trucks everywhere as well as those hauling chips and saw dust. Nothing goes to waste.