Sherry was talking with some friends prior to the trip, and somehow it came out that Jim and Julie also were spending the weekend at the coast, right in Depoe Bay where the wedding was! At their encouragement (it didn't take much) we abandoned the hotel we had secured (thankfully at not cost to us) and joined them in Julie's cousin's home. Right above the ocean, it sleeps twelve so it was very roomy.
We got to the coast early on Friday, and had several hours to kill before meeting up with them. There was a state park perched right on top of a bluff over the ocean with a big grassy area. We threw the ball for Kadie and then played a game of acey deucey (Sherry barely won, but I actually let her) while enjoying a warm, sunny afternoon - at the Oregon coast! In fact, the weather was awesome the entire weekend.
We went crabbing! I had no idea how it worked, thinking maybe you just dug them up out of the sand. Nope, we went out on a boat and threw crab pots overboard, baited with thawed chicken breasts. We'd wait a while and then haul the pot up and grab the crabs. Even though I was wearing gloves I was still a bit discomfited rooting around and grabbing these scrambling little clawed creatures. We would measure them to see if they were of proper length, and if not pitch right back into the bay. Turned out that we had only two that met the requirements, so we decided to go out for dinner.
We went to a restuarant called April's, and it was wonderful. I'm not a big seafood fan, so I usually default to the lone steak offering to pacify the landlubbers like me. They served a New York steak with an apricot glaze that was to die for. The only disappointment was that they didn't have onion rings. I really like a few onion rings with my steak. They were a bit offended and responded that "there is no need to deep fry anything in this establishment". I had to forgive them as the steak was that good. We were acting goofy and laughing so hard I thought they would kick us out, but we were ringing up a pretty hefty tab and that seemed to have mitigated our good natured obnoxiousness.
Reed and Andrea's wedding was a great experience. They are adventure racers, and you can read a great article about their romance here (don't miss the part about them being "mushy gushy in love"!). Reed is tall, and everyone said that for some reason his tuxedo seemed to add a few inches to his height! Andrea looked beautiful in her dress, and Sherry said to me "I want us to look like them", in a reference to their obvious fit appearance. I guess that a fit appearance doesn't fit me! The ceremony was personal, moving and unique as the children were involved too. It was very windy (it was outdoors) but the location at the Flying Dutchman winery could not have been better as they had a private little garden/reception area with a patio deck right at the edge of a cliff overlooking the ocean. Reed's friend Colin officiated, and he was eloquent and fun all at the same time.
Well, as you noticed I prefaced the word "wonderful" in the title with a disclaimer of "mostly". On Sunday, we left around 1:00 PM and drove north to Lincoln City. Intending to return to Tigard (suburb of Portland) by going through Grand Ronde and then McMinnville on Highway 18. I have to be honest, about 6 miles out of Lincoln City I saw a sign that said "Road Closed" ahead. I was a bit puzzled and I should have turned around at that instant. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. About another 2 miles we ran into a wall of cars. We sat there for about 10 minutes and didn't move atll. Then, we began creeping. And stopping. And creeping. And stopping. It soon became apparent that our (slow) progress was due to cars turning around somewhere up the road. We had rounded a bend, and had enough view to see scores of cars down the road, without exaggeration I believe we could see about a hundred vehicles from where we were.
Later we found that it turned out to be a multiple fatality accident right at Grand Ronde, and investigators were recreating the scene, transporting the victims, interviewing witnesses, clearing the road, etc etc. Horrible loss due to a truck crossing the centerline and hurtling directly into two motorcycles, then veering back into traffic and sideswiping two other cars.
Well, eventually we turned around too. The rest of the day went like this:
- We returned to 101, and headed north. We had a high level (not detailed) map, and saw that Highway 22 appeared to take us east to the extent that we believed we would miss whatever was happening on 18. We drove about half an hour and then hit a dead stop with cars lined up for at least a half mile we could see. I knew from the milepost signs that there was still about 5 miles to go until it intersected with 18, so it was not unreasonable to estimate that there was a 4 mile traffic jam.
- We returned to 101, and headed north. Looking at the map, we saw back roads leading out of Cloverdale that appeared to go directly east toward Yamhill, from which we could have dropped into Sherwood and then home. After consulting with some helpful locals who asked if we had sleeping bags and food for what would likely be an overnight stay because one wrong turn would get us lost for hours, we abandoned that idea.
- We returned to 101, and headed north. We were hungry, so we stopped for an early dinner in Tillamook and intended to take Highway 6 to Banks and then to 26 and return home. A tow truck driver was also stopping for lunch, and we began talking about the wreck on 18 which he had been monitoring from his radio. He mentioned that Highway 6 had also just reported a bad accident with traffic backed up and only one lane getting through. Sigh.
- We returned to 101, and headed north, intending to go to Seaside and then take 26 back to Portland and then home. Out of Nehalem we remembered Highway 53, which cut about 11 miles off of 26 and would allow us to avoid Seaside. We traveled 53 without incident, and then hit a wall of cars on 26.
- We considered returning to 101 and going to Astoria and taking Highway 30 down to Portland, but then decided after numerous attempts that day at going east to just stick it out on Highway 26. It took us almost two hours to get from milepost 11 to 24, and we thought there had been a big wreck on 26 (which is not uncommon unfortuneately). At milepost 24 though the traffic opened up like sunrise after a dark night and we made it home without further delay.
