To the coast!

It was with much reluctance that we handed back our shiny red bicycles on Saturday morning and traded them in for a car.  We then took the car back to our apartment to pick up our luggage and say fond farewells to our airbnb host Tony.  

As we drove out of Portland, we saw the following sign, a reminder that we should probably be doing a cycling holiday

Sadly today the glorious sunny weather left us, and it began to rain, and rain, and rain.

We arrived in Astoria, and whatever this town has to offer will forever remain a mystery to us.  Even the tourist trolley bus gave up today and stopped running in the early afternoon.

Fortunately, Stuart had booked us in to a lovely B&B, called the Red Rose Inn and had even ordered a dozen red roses for our room.  I love flowers, so these will be going on tour with us!

We salvaged what we could from the day, by heading to a lovely seafood restaurant.  The restaurant occupies a converted boat repair shed right on river front, and what the picture below fails to show is that the whole building is being battered by howling gales throughout the meal.  

Perhaps as well that we aren't cycling this part of the holiday!

Sunday morning and if anything the weather is worse!

Unperturbed we plough on, and head for Ecola beach.  Despite the foul weather I take two of my favourite pictures so far -

Ecola beach is where some of the scenes of the Twighlight movie were filmed.  Sadly there was no sign of Jacob ripping his shirt off, and although Stuart offered to reconstruct the scene, the other tourists declined.

We slowly motor down the coast stopping at suitable rainy day spots, including the aircraft museum at Tillamook.  What is interesting about this museum is that it was built to house wartime blimps and is the largest wooden clear span structure ever built.  Bizarrely it seems to be housing more RVs than aircraft at the moment.

Our final destination for the day is Lincoln City, and we have booked into a motel that claims to be the no 2 most romantic hotel in the US, per Trip Advisor 2012.

Whilst we do have a gorgeous balcony overlooking the ocean to watch the sunset, plus a cozy fireplace, we think the motel is overselling itself and in the morning give them a list of reasons why it isn't the no 2 most romantic hotel in the US. Surprisingly the receptionist says she couldn't agree more!

Anyway, we had our own roses and in the morning the sun has returned.

We are ready to head to Florence.