Last push to the Pacific

Today we split up. Jeff and I headed to the coast and Dave headed into Portland. We headed west through McKenzie Pass which is a fantastic, narrow, traffic-less road over a pass to the other side of the Cascades. No idea how those folks in covered wagons did this. There were lava fields here and there and snow. This road is sort of like the Tail Of The Dragon road in the Blue Ridge Mountains with curve after curve after curve but with Lava beds. After coming down out of the Cascades we hit a long flat stretch with more farms (hay and cows) which is different than the ground crops we saw on the other side of the Cascades (wheat). I was expecting it to be flat all the way to the ocean but there was another little range of small mountains after this flat patch (Coastal Range). This is lumber country and all the trucks have logs or are on the way to get more logs. Looks like this is their livlihood here.
We hit the Pacific in Newport and turned north on Rt 101. If you stay on 101, it is pretty busy and a little tacky. Deb had been over here the previous week and said you have to get off 101 to really see the ocean. We stopped at a couple spots for pics, but kept pushing north to get to Cannon Beach (which is a must see that we did not see). Rain started up after a couple hours on the coast and we stopped and put on rain gear. We decided to head back inland on Rt 6 and get to Portland. Our friend Pam was expecting us for dinner at 6 so we decided to call it quits on the coast road. Rt 6 was a really nice road and by the time we pulled into Portland, the rain had stopped. Jeffs GPS does not have any west coast stuff into it and my GPS is on my iPhone so we stopped for gas and I wrote the last few turns on a piece of paper and stuck in my gas cap (my Dad would be pround). Good old 1950's GPS (Good-ol Paper System). We pulled into Pams a little early and she was just getting home from work. She and her son Scott (who used to be this cute little 2 year old back in Vermont was now a tall nice college student). Deb pulled up an hour later with her snazzy Mustang that she and Aunt Ginny had been cruising the coast in the previous week. We had a wonderful evening catching up on what everyone had been doing these last 20 years. I called my neice and my family is getting together tomorrow (Friday) afternoon. Lots of errands tomorrow.