The Coast with The Hopester

Ye of the East Coast (and West Coast of FLA) -

We hereby challenge you to a coast-down...a coast-off...a coast-vs-coast mega-monster-dome-spectacular. Which coast is the best coast? The left coast of course. And we have photos to prove it.

Your coast is weak sauce, my friends, with its warm sandy beaches, German tourists, and ice cream vendors just steps away. Your coast rarely threatens with rogue waves or great white sharks. Your coast does not require that you wear shoes to enter the water. Your coast makes friends not with the bracing Pacific wind, but with the easy-going Gulf Stream, keeping things nice and toasty and Coppertone.

Yes, people - our coast is both a terror, and a delight. At once roaring like a lion, and purring like a kitten. But who can tame this ferocious beast? Who can melt its icy shores with a spirited laugh and a cheeky smile? Whose little pink hat deflects even the mightiest of gusts?

...it was August 1 when Hope ran aground on the Oregon Coast...


























Okay, you get the picture. We had a *wonderful* long weekend at Garner's Getaway, in the sleepy town (or more accurately, tipsy town, since there was clearly no open container law in effect) of Netarts, in the vicinity of Tillamook and the Three Capes Scenic Area. Happy Camp Way is a string of houses (ours one of them) right on the beach where Netarts Bay meets the ocean. There were swarms of brown pelicans, seagulls, and mures, as well as fishermen, kayakers, and clammers, and we watched them all from our balcony, performing their elaborate dance each day with the tides.

We found a great seafood market across from the cheese factory, and cooked all our meals in the house except our final lunch (oyster burger and fish n'chips on the road, in Manzanita). Hope did really well adjusting to sleep in a strange room and a stranger's pack n'play. Except for day 1, she slept through every night like a pro.

I actually *read* on vacation - - something I haven't been able to pull together in nine months of trying. I'm half-way through Heat by Bill Buford, and enjoying it thoroughly. (Now, we'll have to see if I can finish it.) B and Hope had some really wonderful 1:1 bonding time, and went on an epic beach tour by themselves one morning, discovering a live starfish and some other wonders of the Pacific coast.


















Three side trips of note: one early on to Blue Heron French Cheese, in search of a few good wines and the ever-popular petting zoo. Second to Cape Meares, with its awesome bird-covered rocks and Octopus Tree. Third was on the way home - - we finally turned off in Manzanita, a gorgeous be-shingled enclave on a perfect stretch of beach looking up toward Cape Falcon and a haystack rock (I'll find the name and update here).



We vowed to make it an annual affair. Who will join us?

xo
BN&H