Thanks Oregon

It's high time I shared some of my photos from my trip to the Oregon Coast back in April. My dad invited me and my niece Maggie on a vacation house-hunting adventure. We looked at probably a dozen homes from Cannon Beach to Pacific City, from cozy cottages to an all-out giant of a house. Most with ocean views, some ocean front, and one Nehalem State Park-front. All beautiful, all so much fun to see ourselves vacationing at as a family. In the end though, none spoke up to my dad and said, "Buy me!" so he'll continue the search, which for him, is sometimes more fun that the actual purchasing.

We flew to PDX on a Tuesday, stopped at Kenny & Zukes Bagelworks (of course) on our way out of town, and got to Cannon Beach and our usual little rental that afternoon. The sun was out and Haystack Rock gleamed in the misty sunshine. Maggie was in heaven - it was her first time at the ocean. She chased birds while the waves chased her. She touched kelp, threw rocks, tasted salt. I loved watching her explore her new environment.

The next morning, we meandered down the coast to Pacific City, where Vanessa met up with us. We all toured a monstrous, three-story oceanfront beauty (3,000+ square feet!), then my dad and Maggie headed back to Cannon, and Vanessa and I drove the Three Capes Scenic Drive and shot a whole lot of film along the way. We also stopped at Garibaldi's harbor, and wandered the docks. Vanessa stayed with us in Cannon that night, and we all toured homes in Manzanita, Nehalem, and Tolovana throughout the day, before she headed back to Portland.

On Friday, we took a leisurely drive through Arch Cape, where a few of these images are from. The weather was quintessential Oregon Coast weather - swirling mists, clouds, fog, heavy rain, spots of sunshine - and the trees in Arch Cape combined to create epic photo opportunities. I shot almost an entire pack of Polaroid 600 in five minutes there, several images from this roll in my Pentax K1000, a bunch of iPhone pics, and half a dozen Fuji instants too. It was a whirlwind, and so much fun. After that, we drove through Manzanita and on to Cape Meares so Maggie could see her first lighthouse, and she ended up seeing about 100 harbor seals too.

On our last day, we took the long way back to PDX, up through Astoria and into Portland via Highway 30, with a short detour across the Astoria-Megler Bridge and up to Dismal Nitch in Washington. That way, Mags got to add another state to her list of those visited, if only for a few minutes. It was a lovely drive, and a beautiful way to end such a nice, relaxing vacation. I have stacks of Polaroids to share, and I will eventually on my Flickr page. Head over there to see more from this roll. Thanks Oregon, for another beautiful visit.