Where in the World are Jeff and Sue?: Day 7: Could Someone Please Pass Me A Pillow!?!

Although we are having an awesome time, traveling is tiring! We stopped early tonight (about 6:30) so we can just lay around.

This morning we really didn’t know which way we wanted to go but after getting advice from a couple of locals we decided to go NW first, to Astoria. This is where the Columbia River, and by default the Snake River (the Columbia did eat the Snake!), meet with the Pacific. And… since we have been dancing with the Snake River, and in turn the Columbia, since Yellowstone, it seemed only fitting that we should see the river’s final destination.

The lush, green, and hilly scenery on the way there was beautiful and it was satisfying seeing the estuary (where the river meets the ocean). But… I’m not gonna lie, our favorite attraction was the awesome 4 mile bridge that went over the Columbia River from Oregon to Washington! We crossed it, and came back, for no other reason than it was sweet!

After we drove through Astoria we continued down HWY 101 (scenic byway) which follows the Pacific coastline south. We went through many cute little towns and saw a lot of rocky cliffs, huge rock formations sticking up off of the shore (including “Haystack Rock”), and great wave action (it was breezy). We also took a hike that started at a pull off on the side of the road and lead to a steep cliff (2-3 hundred feet down, hard to tell) and at the bottom, the ocean was crashing into the rock and swirling in, out, and around in a couple of caves. It was really a site and totally worth the hike! We also saw a snail taking a walk, which I have pix of:).

The drive is slow, and we started early, so we’re crashing in a little town called Tillamook in a cute inn that we got a great deal on. Tillamook is almost directly west of Portland… LOL.

The plan for tomorrow? … Redwood NP… Crater Lake… there’s some awesome rock formations in a state park in Coos Bay (SW of Eugene on the ocean) that we would love to see… we’ll decide in the morning.

Until tomorrow