Back Home from Memory Lane

After 5 days of auto-traveling to and from northern California, it was nice to be home in our little abode. Today it's do-all-the-laundry-day, and catch up on the e-mails, Ravelry and my blog (not necessarily in that order). We had a wonderful trip visiting family in southern Oregon (where I spent quite a few of my growing up years), traveling south from there to Redding, California. The temperature those first few days was in the 100's and we decided to head for the Coast. We crossed the mountains to Eureka, CA where I was born and drove over to Samoa where I lived for the first 12 years of my life. I really wanted to take a picture of the house i lived in and it's relationship to the ocean. Samoa is on a peninsula and we were the last house before the beach. Well............they say you should never go back and they're right. The house was so rundown - trash everywhere all around the yard, broken glass, etc. it was very hard to look at. So, no pictures were taken of the house. We had lunch at the Samoa Cookhouse where many years ago my Dad ate meals at when he was still a bachelor and worked at Hammond Lumber Company. From there we decided to follow Highway 101 up the coasts of California, Oregon and Washington on our way home. The weather was sunny the entire way, and quite warm for the coast. We took several quick jaunts down to the beach along the way and enjoyed the views and the nice temps (probably in the 70's).

While we were looking out at the rocks trying to see any seals, this friendly little squirrel came within arm's reach and was eating berries from the salal bushes in front of us. He watched us warily, but kept right on eating and didn't run away when we moved around!

We had not made any motel reservations along the way, and come Saturday night, we couldn't find a place to lay our head anywhere along the Coast. Should have known better - with the sunshine and warm weather, everyone went there for the weekend, so we ended up driving from Coos Bay to Astoria then east to I-5 and home all in one day. That was one loooonnnngg day - left around 9am and got home at 10:30pm! Course we stopped a few places along the way. All in all, it was a wonderful trip and nice to get away for a while.