Coffee anyone?

Just curious as to how the northwest got so associated with coffee and do they actually consume more coffee?  Starting with Redding, California and now all the way into Walla Walla, Washington we see in every town so many drive thru coffee stands.  Just about every major intersection has one and they are, from their names, different companies.  Even the little town of Myrtle Creek, Oregon where we stopped had a couple.

The other interesting item is that you do not pump your own gas in Oregon or Washington.  Each gas station is called “mini-serve”.  There is an attendant who takes your payment and pumps the gas.  It actually takes longer if the station has multiple customers as there is only one attendant on duty to handle all customers.  I sort of like it as the diesel pump is usually always as mess and stinks so letting someone else pump it is fine with me.  The “mini-serve” service does not seem to increase the price as we have found diesel to be about the same price as it was in other states. 

Started our Washington wine tasting today with a walk through the downtown of Walla Walla.  Many wineries have tasting rooms downtown and we stopped at the ones that were open during the week (just a couple).  As expected, great Syrah’s and Pinot Noir’s.  We will most likely do a couple of other sections of the tasting map for this area.  There must be over 50 wineries in this area. 

Walla Walla, WA

(Sounds like the chorus from a pop song)

We drove from Portland to Walla Walla, Washington today.  The best part of the drive was going through the Columbia River Gorge.  In my previous post I showed some pictures on our drive on the scenic highway.  Today we went on Interstate 84, which is right next to the scenic highway and is actually the old scenic highway in places.  The views were spectacular for many miles until we cleared the gorge and moved into eastern Oregon.  We even saw a herd of Rams on the side the hill as we drove by on the interstate.

We pulled into Walla Walla at an RV park I scoped out in advance via the internet.  It seems really nice an is reasonably priced.  The only issue is they are resurfacing the asphalt sections so they put us on the edge of the park in a grass space, which is very nice, but it meant I had to do my first back-in since we started.  I performed perfectly (pat on the back!).

Here is a picture of our rig in its space

Here is a picture of the view from our back window

We stopped in Walla Walla as it is about half way between Portland and Spirit Lake, Idaho, where we are headed next, plus it was recommended to us by one of the wineries we visited earlier as the place to stop to do tastings of Washington wines.  So, that is what we will be doing the next couple of days, tasting wine!

Camping Resources

I was talking with my daughter today and she was asking about our process on selecting where we are going to stay.  Her and her friends who read the blog wanted to know.  So this posting is for you….

Presently we have an outline in mind of where we want to head to.  Part of it is dictated by being in a certain place for an event, which for now is Idaho by May 7th.  Towards that we select a route, preferably scenic and then look at possible stops along that route, about 200 to 250 miles apart.  We then use our camping guides, Woodall’s and AAA, to look where RV parks are located.  Once we find some RV Parks then we use the computer to do additional research to prepare a list of places acceptable.  We are looking for big rig friendly parks, good site width so we are comfortable and a reasonable price.  We also enter the park name into Google which then gives you reviews of the parks, so you can see what people who have stayed there are saying.  In addition we use Google Earth to view the park from the air to see what the area is around it and does it match with what they are saying in their write-up.  We generally do not make reservations at a park and have not had an issue yet.  The reason for this is we like to check the park out first before deciding, plus if you change your mind while driving then you are out that first night’s cost as a cancellation fee.  We have also learned, the hard way, to only pay for a couple of nights at a time as plans change or you end up not liking the park for some reason and if you leave they do not refund unused nights. 

On the road we may change our mind on where to stop because we see a nice area or were delayed while driving for some reason.  If this is the case we then have our new tablet computer, Motorola Xoom, available to use to do the research on the fly, plus our GPS has AAA tour book information built into it.

We are members of the Good Sam club and KOA so we do get 10% discounts at parks affiliated with either of those.  We have met fellow full timers who have mentioned Passport America, Camp Club USA and Thousand Trails as additional organizations you can join to get discounts.  We have looked into each of those but are not sure due to the many restrictions on Passport America and Camp Club USA and the high cost for Thousand Trails. 

So far our process has worked fairly well.  We were disappointed with the KOA in West Sacramento but generally satisfied with all the others we have been to.  The one in Redding was selected while driving as we changed our mind and that ended up being one of the nicest places we have stayed. 

Impressive!

Pictures from the Columbia River Scenic Highway

Portland, Oregon (Actually Troutdale, OR)

We have made it to the Portland area and rain is still in the forecast along with cold nights and mild days.  Winter is still hanging on!

We drove here from Myrtle Creek on Wednesday and stayed in the parking lot of the Camping World in Wood Village, Oregon.  Why in the Camping World parking lot you ask?  Previously in the week we decided to go forward with the purchase of a roof mounted automatic satellite dish.  Since we average about two set-ups and take downs of the satellite dish each week and we were encountering problems in getting the dish aligned we felt this was a better way to go.  The cost was significant and that was the main reason why we passed on doing this early.  Fortunately they were having a sale on the dish we wanted plus we had a coupon for 50% off on the installation, so those two things made it somewhat more easier to go for it.  Our appointment was for 8 am on Thursday so they allowed us to stay in their parking lot with an electrical hook-up provided.

The install was supposed to take half a day but ended up being the entire day (5pm).  We got the trailer and went to an RV park just down the road.  It is a very nice park with level, concrete spaces and nice separation between spaces.

Here is a picture of our dish on the trailer.

Set up now involves pushing the power button on the control box.  About 2 minutes later the dish is aligned and the receivers are getting shows.  The downside is it is permanently mounted so trees and buildings can be a factor in blocking the dish.  We still have our old dish as a backup, just in case.

Coos Bay

We are still in Myrtle Creek, Oregon and realized that since we have made it west we have yet to to go the coast or see the ocean.  We rectified that on Monday by taking a drive over to the Oregon coast.  About 80 miles west of us is Coos Bay and Charleston, which are right on the Oregon coast.  It was a beautiful drive through the hills and spectacular views at the coast.  We stopped for lunch at the Portside Restaurant in the Charleston marina then took a scenic drive through the state park that is there.  The scenic drive reminded us of the 17 mile drive in Big Sur, California.  Here are some pictures.

As it is officially been two months since we started this adventure, here is an updated interstate map showing our travels to date.

If you compare this one with the one month picture you will notice we have slowed down significantly.  We now travel about 200 miles then stay for around 4 days before moving on.  It is much more relaxing and spreads out the gas expense!  (Diesel is around $4.25/gallon in Oregon).

Oregon Wines

We left Kool April Nites in Redding, CA on Friday and drove about 200 miles north on Interstate 5 stopping in Myrtle Creek, OR.  This is between Medford and Roseburg.  I had scoped out a nice campground about 2 miles off the interstate, Tri-City RV Park.  The description and satellite picture proved to be correct.  It is a small park that is nicely maintained with level concrete spaces and grass in between sites.  The best part is the 360 degree view you have.  Here are a couple of pictures of our views.

The downside is the rain.  I am writing this on Sunday morning and it has just stopped raining for the first time since we got here.  It does make the place very green!

On Saturday we went exploring.  This area is a wine region for Oregon (Umpqua Valley).  It is home to about 20 or so boutique wineries.  They each produce around 1000 cases per year and sell locally or just at the winery.  Seems that the best wines in this area are Pinot Noirs and Syrah’s with some dry white wines that are also very good.  Here is the wine tour map for the area.

We started north near Sutherlin with the Reustle Prayer Rock winery.  From all the wineries we have visited this one ranks at the top of the list.  The winery itself is beautiful and then for the tasting you go into their cave and sit in a small alcove where you are presented 5 wines with paired appetizers.  It was a great experience.

From there we visited 3 other wineries nearby and then called it a day as the rain had started to come quite hard and we were competing with a wine tour event for the area that had 5 bus loads of people visiting the wineries in the valley.  Also, they pour generously at each winery so 4 was enough.   Since these are small wineries you are meeting the owners, who are the winemakers, at each stop and they were all very nice and enjoyable to talk to.