[May 2014: Just discovered this post in my blog drafts folder. Photos were in, but text was very telegraphic, clearly waiting to be fleshed out, which I never did. Posting it with very little editing just for completeness.]
Bend, Oregon
Arrived on a rainy, cold Thursday. Temperature dropped some 40 degrees. Visitor's Center with no parking--not a good sign for RVs. But we got brochures on all the things that interest us: art, craft beer, walking tours, public art (20 some traffic circles with sculptures: Roundabout Art Route), each with and dog parks. Our kind of town.
Friday
Art in the High Desert and we got us some. Two metal sculptures (one a wall piece, and one of the tall metal vases) by this fellow.
Trick to going to a big festival in a city: go early. Friday, first hour. Scored a great parking spot, facing straight out of the exit--we couldn't get blocked in. Or could we? We made a trip back to the RV to put away our art purchases, and found this. I had to take a picture of the license plate, just in case things didn't go well.
Thank goodness this fellow was gone when we were ready to leave, and our new neighbor gave us enough room to get into the RV.
Saturday
RV sales set up next to us at the resort RV park we were staying in (and which we shan't ever stay in again--too $$$ and after this reservation, German shepherds are no longer allowed!). There were 3 huge Class As for sale in the ONE space next to ours--that's how big the sites were. Our 25 footer looked even more peculiar in the big site than ever. We were eager to find a way to spend the day away from the RV park because of the sales situation. Drove up to Mount Bachelor and took a short hike in the national forest, where Bago could play off leash. Took Bago to a great dog park with a pond. Made new friends.
Went to see a great movie, The Way Way Back. Sunny when we went in; cool and deep puddles when we came out. Picked up a tip at the Safeway after the movie: best movie deal in town is $2 Tuesdays at McMennamins. Remember this for next visit....
Sunday
Dawned rainy and cold, so we headed to the coast, with a brief stop in the very cute town of Sisters.
Ended up at Tillicum Beach, run by the National Forest folks, our new favorite campgrounds. Bago sure loves Oregon beaches.
Monday
Revisited Bandon. Last time we were there, we had the most delicious barbecued oysters, but that restaurant is now gone. We ate at its replacement, but only found it OK. Discovered the
very cool Washed Ashore Project, which we should definitely have in MoCo.
Tuesday
Cape Blanco--more beaches. Our second time at this state park, and it's still one of our favorites. Pleased to note that the hike down to the beach is very easy now; we thought it was quite difficult back in 2009.
Wednesday
Tooled through the National Park, and stayed at Richardson Grove State Park (boo on California state parks and their ridiculous rules--no dogs anywhere, no generators till 10AM-- and prices).
Tooled through Northern California (complete with elk jam), with lunch in Petaluma just north of San Francisco. Tried out Marin RV Park, using our usual strategy of laying up somewhat near home so we can dump and pull into home early in the day. (We also didn't want to deal with Bay Area afternoon/rush hour traffic.)
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