Newport has a lot to offer but it certainly has gotten busy over the years. You can’t avoid the beautiful Bay Bridge and it is worth a stop to really look at it.
Friends from North Ranch were supposed to volunteer for the summer at Yaquina Head Lighthouse north of Newport but they hadn’t arrived yet. With a stop at the beautiful new interpretive center, I drove out to the lighthouse and walked around. Don’t think I would like being there for a summer. The protected bird colonies that covered the tops of the huge rock mounds in the ocean were really, really stinky and the summer hadn’t even arrived yet. It is the tallest lighthouse on the Oregon Coast at 93’, first lit in 1873.
Having just come from a winter in the desert, my mouth watered for some seafood and MO’s Restaurant was recommended. It was so jammed, I went across the street to Eleanor’s Undertow to assuage my hunger for halibut.
Since I could take an entire year telling you stories of the Oregon Coast, I’ll move on. The husband of a fiend of mine worked in the higher echelon of a major prison system throughout his career and was appalled at my going tenting across the country. Although they are RVers, he compared it to living under a bridge. I promised myself the luxury of a motel if the weather turned bad and it was cool and rainy when I hit Astoria. I sought brick and motor shelter. I won’t tell you the name for obvious reasons.
I became acquainted with the charming young couple who had just started managing it and enjoyed some of the spaghetti he had made for guests. When I returned for a breakfast of sweet cakes, coffee, and conversation the next morning, he asked if I had slept well. I had but he informed me they brought in the cops during the night and a couple of doors had been kicked in during a search for drugs. They are struggling to change the motel’s image. Though the situation was certainly serious, I had to laugh at how much more safe I was in a motel than in a campground. Hmmm.
God Bless until next time.
At 45, Widow Minshall began 20 years of solo full-time RVing throughout Alaska, Mexico, and Canada. Sharlene canoed the Yukon, mushed sled dogs, worked a dude ranch, visited Hudson Bay polar bears, and lived six months on a Mexican beach. She lectured at Life on Wheels, published six RV-related books and wrote a novel, “Winter in the Wilderness.”
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