“Blast Off” Day

We got out of Tumwater today about 12:30 after our dental appointments.  Got the old choppers cleaned and some x-rays and we’re good to go until March.  We made it as far as the Pilot Truck Stop, 2 exits south of our Blast Off zone.  Fueled up and were on our way for real this time.

We only planned to drive as far south as the Camping World in Wilsonville, Oregon for the night.  We have an appointment tomorrow morning and then we’ll be continuing our journey south.  When we arrived at Camping World this afternoon, we found a good spot to park the motorhome where we could extend our passenger side slide.  This makes it so much easier to sleep at night with the bed extended.  No hook-ups but we use the generator when we need some power. 

I called my cousin and his wife when we got settled in at C.W. and arranged to meet them about 3 miles north of our location.  We were going to an Italian restaurant for dinner.  We met at the Borders Bookstore and browsed some books for a while and then we wandered over to the Pastini Pastaria.

                                                           Here we are, L to R:  Bruce, Me, Diana and John. 

Both the meal and the conversation were great and we had a wonderful evening.  John and Diana will be flying off to Montreal on Thursday for a 7-day cruise that will take them to Boston.  They are not RVer’s, but do a lot of international travel yearly.  They go to Italy for weeks at a time every year at some point. 

John and I were kids together down in Southern California and shared many a family gathering.  He spent many years working in San Francisco as an attorney and then retired and he and Diana moved to Oregon.  We always enjoy our time together even though we no longer “kids”. 

We said our good-byes and drove back to the motorhome to take Annie out for a walk.  The parking lot is now packed with RV’s of all types.  No matter, we should sleep like babies tonight, finally being happy to be on the road again. 

Our plan is to go south to Eugene on I-5 and then go west on Hwy. 126 to Florence on the coast.  We’ll take Hwy. 101 south to Coos Bay where we plan to stay the night at the Mill Casino.  They have dry camping space plus a nice full hook-up RV park. 

Not much to write about today since the day wasn’t filled with a lot of excitement.  I did get a kick out of a comment left by Anonymous who asked, “Don’t you ever smile?”  Good question.  Yes….I smile and laugh a lot especially when the Grands and I play together.  You can’t help but laugh with them around.  I guess I was concentrating on what Mackenzie was doing to my hair in that pic and didn’t even think about smiling.  Sometimes she likes to pin my hair up in weird hair clips with feathers on them, so I never know how silly I could look.  I was also sitting and waiting and waiting and waiting for Bruce to take the photo.  He isn’t usually behind the camera and seems to be so sloooooow with everything.  (don’t tell him I said that)    I’ll try to make sure I smile next time, Anonymous!  Thanks for reading and looking at the pics in the blog….judging from your comment I do know that you are paying attention!  Thanks.

It’s been raining for the past 3 or 4 hours here near Portland.  I’m hoping the rain will be gone tomorrow morning for our drive over to the coast.  The views are usually so beautiful in this area.  Hopefully, I can get a few nice photos for tomorrow’s post.  Time will tell.

Until next time…..so long for now!