The Beauty of the Oregon coast

Finally, we got to the Oregon coast....the first thing was to get to a beach and inhale all that great ocean fragrance ! Ahhhhhhh.

Doesn't that look inviting !?

We let Katie loose on the beach a couple of times....first time she ever saw the Pacific Ocean....or any ocean for that matter.

Zooooooom!

Boy...running after seagulls is exhausting !!

You'll notice the camera angle is a bit jerky (a bit !!??) on this youtube video we uploaded because she's hard to track with the lens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0Ou5x5jwo4&index=14&list=PLhD-K74hlLjLuGi8RiJap9Ugc5k3uD5Ta

Some spectacular views from the land looking at the rock formations.

Look at these gnarly rocks !!

I like to get right down on the ground to take these photos.

We drove out to one lighthouse and got a tour. Cape Blanco, the western-most lighthouse in Oregon.

You can see the Frensel lens which cast the light 20 miles so that the ships could know where they were and avoid the coastal rocks.

View looking north from the top of the lighthouse.

Close-up of the lens. Each of those pieces are individual and put together then shipped to the US.

Here's a link all about the lenses. Interesting article.

http://partsolutions.com/the-million-dollar-lens-the-science-and-history-behind-the-fresnel-lighthouse-lens/

Talk about job security...get this: James Langlois and James Hughes were both stationed at Cape Blanco Lighthouse for their entire career, which lasted forty-two years for Langlois and thirty-seven years for Hughes. 

 By the late 1890s, Keeper Hughes had two children and Langlois five. Fortunately, the second assistant keeper, who lived with the families in the station’s duplex, was single, but still the residence was becoming crowded. The inspector recommended the construction of an additional dwelling at the cape starting in 1897, but it took over ten years of requests before a one-and-a-half-story, frame dwelling was completed in 1910.

http://www.lighthousefriends.com/light.asp?ID=125

Cape Blanco Light station in 1936 with both dwellings 

Looking south from the top.

We saw more sights but we'll save that for another entry.

steve/kim/katie

The Dahlias are in bloom !

 While in North Bend/Coos Bay area in Oregon, we visited the Shore Acres Park where there is a wonderful garden full of flowers, trees, shrubs and foliage. This time, the Dahlias were in full bloom. There were four "squares" of them in the gardens. Spectacular.

The yellow squares were filled with the Dahlias.

Let's let the flowers beauty speak for themselves....

They don't allow dogs in the park, so I carried Katie for a while before taking her for a long walk in the nearby forest. She couldn't wait to get down and do some sniffing.

A butterfly came and landed on one of the flowers and stuck around long enough for Kim to take some closeups.

Our camera has a close-up feature on it so we can get right up to the object, so I took some of those to show the amazing Dahlias. Notice how their petals are all unique.

Aren't they gorgeous !!??

These are good photos to show two of the four squares.

There were other greenery around but the stars were the Dahlias. They also have a fantastic viewpoint of the nearby cliffs with breaking waves but that's for another entry.

steve/kim/katie

Avenue of the Giants. Redwoods in California

On our way up to the Oregon coast, we wanted to stop to see the giant Redwoods in Northern California. We've done this twice before and have never tired of gazing upwards at their majestic heights. So, after 240 miles of up/down twisty-turny, fast/slow, construction zones...we finally got to our destination: Ancient Redwoods RV Park.

These redwoods are over 200 feet tall and between 400 and 900 years old.

We usually go for strolls through the redwoods on marked trails. It's so peaceful and serene.

You can see how large this trunk base was in comparison to Kim and Katie in the foreground. It's massive !

At the Visitor's Center, the had a cut tree displayed that showed how old these trees typically are.

This cut was 70 feet above the ground and look how old it still is !

Katie liked to read the trail signs to keep us on the right path.

Here's a short drive through the 31 mile Avenue.

https://youtu.be/gdpAGq7IpHA

You can see Katie in the background, "Are you guys coming...or what!!??"

Katie LOVED the forest...so many new smells. We called her "Old Blue".

Kim went to the gift shop and got some gorgeous Redwood pieces that we'll have to show in a later blog after we unpack them.

Nice, nice trip with the trees. Steven even hugged one!

That's it for now....hope you enjoy the trees like we did

steve/kim/katie

The Cleanup

Imagine being a house for 56 years and, as the phrase goes, "Anything that came into this house, never left".

That's what has been going on for the last 3 weeks, "making these things leave"...we've been at the house doing cleanup detail....taking things out to the trucks (over eighteen 16-foot trucks so far, including two 40-yard dumpsters) and hauling them to the dump. Dump fees in California are steep....upwards to $165 a trip!!

One of the filled dumpsters....soooo much stuff.

Oh, did I mention that the three cats brought fleas into the house so we needed to put on some protection before going in for the first time?

We ended up talking and coordinating over 75 people for three weeks to get the house in shape and ready for sale. (Cleaners, recycling people, landscapers, sewer pros, pest control, lawyer, bank reps, real estate, etc....)  We're trying to get it on the market and sold because Dad will need the money to pay for his care/medical and hospital expenses. We're opening a special bank account for all of this. We sure don't have the money to pay for it. I'm not sure what people with no resources do.

Maybe when we're done, we'll get back to our six-week trip over to the Oregon coast.

I'm not going to post any of the inside photos. Just remind your older loved ones to start throwing away stuff before you have to get in and do it for them !

steve/kim/katie

Postponed Oregon trip

..not your usual blog entry...but it's a stop along our life's journey...

My Dad has been in the hospital since Saturday. He fell (again), cut up his arm pretty badly so his neighbor took him and they called me on Sunday. Turns out the doctors at Kaiser feel that he's in the early stages of dementia. They give a proven test to see how he grades and he failed.


About 4 weeks ago, we planned a trip down to visit my Dad in Alameda, California then up the coast to the Redwoods, the Oregon coast, the Washington coast, Olympic National Park, and cruise on back home...about a six-week trip.

I get the call on Saturday, the 2nd of September, from the Kaiser Hospital in Oakland that my Dad was in the hospital because he fell. So...we headed off to visit him. We had planned on going down there first to help him get his finances straightened out.

We stopped at Winnemucca, Nevada and Verdi, Nevada (outside of Reno) before landing in Vacaville, California.

Typical desert scene from Nevada

RV park in Nevada...nice place and wonderful to smell the pine trees.

our site is to the far left..out of the picture.

...went for a hike above the RV park...

Turns out, two doctors (independently) have diagnosed him with Advanced dementia. I go to the hospital, only to find out they won't release him until he has 24-hour supervision as he cannot make financial, medical, or personal decisions anymore.

Therefore, our "vacation" has now turned in to a 2-4 week stay driving back and forth to Alameda ( 1 hour and 15 minutes each way...with traffic) to start taking over his house, his finances, etc. No complaining here...just life has just gotten in the way.

It's very strange to have him in this capacity. I never have thought of him as "old" but he's 95 now !! I guess that qualifies.

Here's a synopsis....


We've contracted with an Alameda board-and-care place to house him on a month to month basis where he can be monitored 24 hours a day. The hospital will not release him until I found a place with this requirement. He's moving in there tomorrow.

His house is not an option because (a) the house has a flea problem and (b) no live-in person would want to stay there with the mess that it's in. We got a pest control to work on the house already and he said it's not as bad as we thought.

We planned a six week trip down to see him, then up to the Redwoods, up the coast of Oregon and Washington and home. I came down to get access to his finances and release some money for him to live on. Never expected to run into this life-altering situation.

I guess we're going to start the process to clean up his house, move all the belongings out, stage the house and get it ready to sell. I'm not so sure he'll ever be able to live there again, given his condition. No one thinks he'll improve. So very sad.

NEXT UPDATE...

well, we got dad into a room at a care facility and he seems to be doing fine. I have not visited him yet...wanted to get him adjusted without any outside influence. Neighbors visited him and said he's doing fine...even started sketching the bay view outside. Nice to hear.

we went to the house and brought over two large bags of clothes, slippers, underwear, tee shirts, shirts, pants, clock, radio, two sketch pads with pencils, notepad and some toothbrushes.

i'll go back tomorrow or the next day to gather up more personal belongings he might need, or, if the manager/owner feels he has more that he needs.

Good to hear he's adjusting so well. This has been very emotional for me. I just want him to be okay.

Not much more to report. I've gathered more art supplies for him so he can continue painting and drawing (which is his life's passion). Then, more cleaning out his house and figuring out how to get on top of his finances and make sure bills are paid.

steve/kim/katie

Katie wants to try driving the coach.

arsty-fartsy photograph while on a walk