Yes - we did get home!

It is now the last day in September and I have never completed our trip to the US.  I will attempt to update now....

We left Portland, which we all really liked and headed to Astoria where the film The Goonies was set. This was a very interesting stop.  It is a small town on the estuary of the Columbia River.  We parked the car and had a coffee in the coffee bar below the Goonies house -  well, we think that was the Goonies house.

Walking along the road to get the above view, we found that there was a lot more to Astoria that the Goonies - of course.

At the end of the pier there were a lot of noisy seals - apparently the fishermen do not like them as they eat the salmon!   I don't think the seals really cared much about the fishermen.  We saw a seal being 'helped' off the pier by someone but the seal soon returned to his spot again.

The museum was really interesting too and we enjoyed looking through that.  Despite being at least twenty years old, the cult of the Goonies is still going strong.

Next Goonies stop was Cannon Beach, which proved to be a very large and very up market seaside resort (think Noosa on steroids) and it was quite a way from the town of Astoria - how the kids cycled there is anyone's guess :-)

We had an excellent lunch at this pub

The way to the beach was full of apartments such as those behind us

The Rock where the treasure ship supposedly was in a cave.  

After seeing all the spots related to the movie we now headed south on the coast road back to San Francisco.  We had three days to get there and the only planned thing was to see the giant redwoods.

One of the features of this holiday was the impromptu stops.  We would see something signposted, or we might have looked something up, like the nearest patchwork shop and we pull of the road to check it out.

One such stop came up now - the Umpqa River Lighthouse.  We pulled off the road to see the lighthouse and were just in time for a tour of it.

Next day was our redwood day.  We saw many of these giant trees and boy, are they big.  We started the day at Stout Memorial Grove, where we had a walk through the national park and chatted to the ranger.  Driving on we stopped of at what looked like it might be a rather tacky theme park but it was surprisingly good - and excellent value.  Included in entry price was a ride on their sky rail for great views over the surrounding area.

The next impromptu stop was sort of planned.  Jenny had found a patchwork shop that needed to be checked out at a small town called Ferndale, a few miles of the highway.   Once again this was a great little stop.  The town was just beautiful, time had passed it by but it was well maintained - it was in prime dairy farming area and looked quite prosperous. We just made it to the patchwork shop before it closed at five then had an excellent dinner at the Victorian Inn before heading off again to our overnight stop at Garberville.

Because we had stopped for dinner, we ended up driving through our last redwoods almost in the dark, which rather added to the effect. 

Next day we drove through to Sacramento where we had dinner at our favorite American restaurant, Olive Garden.  The waiter was rather odd - as Kate was driving I had a beer and he asked for ID - as if he needed that to prove I was over 21!

Phew, I have made it to our last day.... It was the 21st of August and there was a total eclipse.  Totality was not visible here, but it was in the towns of Oregon that we had driven through. In fact, they had been getting ready for the great influx of people expected. It was a fantastic day though. Kate had found out that the streets around the capitol building would be closed and people were gathering there, so we left the car at the motel and joined them, walking the several blocks.  It was a great atmosphere.  We had the special glasses so we were able to see the moon biting into the sun. 

This chap was from the local TV station -  he spoke to Kate and I - not sure if it went to air.  Though he did come back to us a little later to question us all over again.  I think he had run of people to talk to. 

Some people had home made viewer that looked a bit odd

After the event (and it did not get very dark at all) we went into the Capitol building for a guided tour.  We did not know any of the governors of California except of course - Arnie.  He has left his mark on the building - namely - his bear, and his portrait.  The building itself is very interesting. 

We returned to the motel for lunch, picked up the car and Kate drove us to the airport at San Francisco with Jenny navigating.  Kate had driven for most of the holiday, I only relieved her a few times.  We dropped the car back at the rental place and caught the train round to the correct terminal, ready for our flight home. 

Blog updated at last!