Oct 20, 2008 - Sylvia Hotel in Newport

We spent the night at the Sylvia Hotel in Newport. Since we arrived after dark the first two pictures were taken in the morning. We had to get shots of the outside of the this interesting hotel to keep it sharp in our memories. The hotel is situated right on the beach with the Yaquina Head Lighthouse just up the coast a short distance.

Sylvia Hotel is a booklovers hotel. There's no TV but lots of books in the 3rd floor library. Candleman and I went to bed at 10, but Mom stayed up reading by the warm fireplace.

We arrived at the hotel in time to have dinner. They serve dinner family style, meaning that everyone sits down at 7:00 and the food is served in bowls that are passed around the table. We had to call in advance and let them know our choice of 3 entrees.

Candleman had rack of lamb that he said was great and Mom and I had scallops and shrimp that was okay. We sat at a table with a couple from Beaverton, Oregon. The owners have us play a game where we tell two truths and one lie. The others can ask a few questions to help them figure out which is which.. We had a lot of fun. The dining are is called the Tables of Content. Clever and cute.

Mom stayed in the Shakespeare room that was decorated really cute. There was a sign above the sink that read, "Out Damn Spot." And in the bathroom another sign reading, "To Pee Or Not to Pee . . ."

Candleman and I stayed in the Herman Melville room. It was decorated as cute as the Shakespeare room, but it was still a fun room. The hotel is very old, but they are doing some fun things to fix it up and the book references all around the hotel added so much to the theme. It was a wonderful experience with only one draw back. Our room was on the 3rd floor (next to the library) and the dining room was down 3 flights. My knees were killing me that day and the climbing was especially bad.

Oct 20, 2008 - Conde B. McCullough Bridges

Clicking on the pictures will enlarge them.
One thing I wanted to do this trip is get pictures of all the bridges along the Oregon coast that were designed by Conde B. McCullough. We saw 7 bridges today and 5 of them are on listed on the National Register. We arrived at the coast in Florence, so our first McCullough Bridge was the Suislaw River Bridge (top) built in 1936.

Thirteen miles north of Florence we crossed the Cape Creek Bridge(upper right) built in 1932. There's a little road that leads from Hiway 101 down to a little beach where we could see the bridge. We could also see the Heceta Head Lighthouse and Inn from that beach. A few years ago Candleman and I found a live crab in one of the tidepools here; no tidepools today as we arrived at high tide so instead we were treated to magnificent waves.
We missed Big Creek Bridge. Were we just not paying attention or did we decide to not stop? I can't remember. The Tenmile Creek Bridge (left) was hard to get a picture of because of all the growth around it, but we did find one little space. Whoops! we missed Cummins Bridge, too.

We did get a couple of pictures (through the windshield) of the Alsea Bridge (right) that joins Waldport and Alsea. This bridge was rebuilt in 1991, but it contains the arch from the original bridge engineered by McCullough.

As the sun was coloring the clouds with restful shades of pink, blue, lavender and orange we stopped on the south side of the Yaquina Bay Bridge (bottom right) for some pictures. This bridge in Newport was built in 1936. It's one of the easiest for me to recognize; maybe because I've taken so many pictures of it.

The last picture is just too beautiful to leave out. I took it from the back seat as we drove over the bridge and off into the sunset. Actually, we headed to the Sylvia Hotel were we were going to have dinner and stay the night.

Oct 19, 2008 - McKeanzie Pass

We drove from Bend to Sisters and then over the McKeanzie Pass (hiway 242). Talk about startling and amazing! On this drive you can see the highest concentration of snowcapped volcanoes (and associated glaciers) in the lower 48 states. We stopped at Dee Wright Observatory, a stone memorial that offers panoramic views of the Cascade Mountain Range as far north as Mt. Hood. The sun had disappeared over the horizon and it was cold and windy so Mom and I stayed in the car, but our brave Candleman climbed the winding trail to the observatory in his shirt sleeves.

The observatory has openings (windows) and each provides a view of one specific volcano peak. So Candleman was to learn the names of some of the mountains we had questions about. Since it was dark our pictures didn't turn out well, but they still provide a reminder to us of this unusual terrain. In the top picture you may be able to see a light spot to the right of the observatory - that is Candleman.

With Dee Wright Observatory behind us, I took a picture from the car at the scene in front of us - the North Sister and the Middle Sister and piles of basaltic rock. This ancient lava flow covers a 65-square-mile area and in some places is 1,700 feet thick.

We stayed that night at the Belknap Springs Lodge.

The map shows the northern part of the Cascade Lake Scenic Drive and our route from Bend through Sisters to Belknap Springs.

Oct 19, 2008 - Bend

Driving into Bend from the eastward loop of the Cascade Lake Byway was beautiful. Our first impressions of what we thought would be an dry, perhaps ugly, little town were soon replaced by the beautiful scene before us. The city was well-laid out and very picturesque as we wound our way into town along the Deschutes River. The trees were lovely dressed in their autumn leaves, the buildings draped the cliffs, and people strolled along the sidewalks enjoying the autumn sun. It was quite idyllic. Sadly, we didn't take any pictures until we arrived at Anthony's Restaurant in the Old Mill District.

We first stumbled upon an Anthony's when visiting Washington state a few years ago. Candleman had blackberry cobbler for desert and, from then on, we always check to see if there's an Anthony's in the area when traveling to the Northwest. This Anthony's was the ONLY one in Oregon. Luckily, it was on our way. Unluckily, they did NOT have blackberry coblber so Candleman settled for huckleberry cobbler, which was good, but not as good as blackberry. I had a delicious salad with grilled salmon. The salmon was topped with a huckleberry-onion sauce. It was to die for.
The first four photos on this post were taken from the Old Mill District. From there we headed to downtown. In the next picture Mom is trying to get this man to forget his woes of an empty wallet by reading her good book, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. We drove past Drake Park with it's Mirror Pond that are both located downtown. Absolutely beautiful. I was able to get one photo of the park before we drove off into the sunset.

Oct 19, 2008 - Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway

The lady at the quilt store in LaPine suggested we take the Cascade Lake Byway because it was so beautiful and it had several lakes. We drove west on a little road 2 miles north of LaPine and then North on the Highway 46 that goes through the community of Elk Lake. We continued on this road as it loops back heading east and drops into Bend. For so much of the drive all we saw was pine trees skirting the road on both sides. We could have seen this on our Utah mountains. I think the lakes must be off side roads. We did drive down one side road to Hosmer Lake.(1st pic) Took several pictures that show Mt. Bachelor in the background. Hosmer Lake is a fly fishing only lake that has trout and fresh water salmon.

We did see one lake from the main road: Devils Lake. (2nd pic) It was beautiful and very unusual. It's hard to see this in the pictures, but the the emerald green water is so clear and shallow that you can see the bottom. They say that boats on the lake look like they are floating in mid-air. We didn't see any boats, unfortunately.
Across the road from the lake was this cliff that hinted of all the volcanic activity that occurred all over this area thousands of years ago.

On this final leg into Bend we could see many mountains of the Cascade Range: Bachelor Mt, the 3 Sister mountains, Washington, Jefferson and Broken Top.

This little map shows our route from LaPine to Bend. Clicking on the map will enlarge it.

Oct 19, 2008 - Outback Trail in Oregon

We left Lakeview after taking a few pictures of the town, unfortunately they turned out a bit fuzzy. We drove right past Alberts Rim and Albert Lake. The amount of light and the shadows didn't show off the rim very well. In hind sight, I wish we had driven a little ways up the road and got a better look. The country north of Lakeview along Highway 395/31 hosts lots of cattle.
Summer Lake was very interesting. There were little puddles of water here and there, but mostly it was light tan dirt. The lake area was huge. It almost filled the whole basin. Candleman said he read that Summer Lake only fills every 300 years or so. We stopped in a small town, probably Paisley, for a rest stop. No gas stations open; only a little grocer, but no restroom. Some ladies directed us to the city park that had a porta-potty. Desperate times call for desperate measures! I took a picture of Paisley's main street because the trees looked so pretty.
Driving into LaPine in hopes of finding a gas station, we passed a quilt store. While Candleman filled the car, Mom and I walked down the street to the quilt store. We figured it would be closed on Sunday, but thought we could get a peek in the windows. Not so, they were covered with pretty curtains,but the door was open. Oh lucky day!

It was such a cute store with lots of fun things. We both bought some fun keepsakes. I bought a tool to make some cute scarves using Homespun fabric.

October 18, 2008 - Adele to Lakeview

Earlier today we saw wild burros, which was surprisingly exciting. However, the real "moving" experience of the day was looking for this sign in Adele, OR. Why bother you might be asking yourself. Awhile ago a booklogger friend, SuziQ posted her own picture of this sign and said, "Bet you've never been here!" I had been there and was passing by this tiny town again soon. Today, in fact! So I had to get a picture. The sign faces the one store that serves as gas station, post office and probably home for several of the few citizens of this little community.

Mom's cough from yesterday grew even more persisitent. She suffered from laryngitis most of the day. Candleman felt improved, but he also had a horrible cough. We all took Cold MD - those two to get better and me to prevent a cold.

From Adele to Lakeview we drove along side a beautiful little stream. Oops! My journal reminds me that it's not a stream but the Camas River. The pictures don't do it justice or else after driving all day through Nevada this little stream looked like an oasis to us.







We asked the clerk at the Best Western Motel in Lakeview for restaurant recommendations. He suggested a Mexican restaurant just next door. We walked around the corner of the motel and took our first look at the restaurant. Whoa! I had huge doubts. No idea what Mom thought, but Candleman was not to be deterred. In we went and in rushed the 3rd, 4th and 5th doubts, although it smelled wonderful. It was the right place to eat. Candleman says it was THE BEST Mexican food he's ever eaten. He ordered Carne Asada, thin strips of steak. Mine was delicious, too. I had Arrozde Pollo (chicken and rice).The name of the restaurant is El Aguila Real. If you are ever in Lakeview, Oregon and if you love Mexican fool, then you really must eat here.

Oct 17, 2008 - Our Travel Gourd

I recently watched a show on the Travel Channel where a young man was taking a trip throughout the northeast to enjoy the fall foilage. One of the first things he did was stop at a roadside stand and buy a gourd for his dash. I thought that was a fun idea.

We stopped at a grocery store in Kamas to find our traveling gourd. They didn't have any gourds, but we did find this cute little pumpkin. Mom thought we should add the two ears of colored corn. I think the idea of a traveling gourd is for good luck - ours was just for ambience because we said a prayer before leaving home asking the Lord to bless us on this trip. I figure that's better than relying on a little gourd. So our gourd/pumpkin is there to make us smile.


It occasionally, does somersaults across the dash because it is enjoying its sojourn on our dash so much. Once I had to hand down some stiff discipline and set him on my lap because he was just way too rambunctious. But most of the time he is well behaved and sits in his little perch enjoying the sights, whispering his pleasure to the corn cobs.