Chillin’ on the Oregon Coast

We’re about to finish the first third of our 3-month RV expedition. We’ll be buttoning up the rig tomorrow and heading off to Brookings, Oregon on Tuesday, July 30th.

Near Brookings

We’ve been on the Oregon Coast since July 5th. The weather has been pretty much the same day by day: low to high 60’s during the day, with upper 50’s at night. Lots of sunshine with occasional clouds or fog.

What’s not to like?

It’s a far cry from the weather in Mesquite, where the daytime temp now hits well above 100 degrees. We don’t miss it.

Our first stop in Oregon was a 1-night “boondock” appearance at the Newport Marina RV Park, where we visited our friends, Dan and Peggy Quinn, and dropped off some mail that we’d been holding for them. We had a barbequed Prime Rib, courtesy of Big Dan (note: it was REALLY GOOD), plus baked taters, and other scrumptious munchies.

Newport Marina RV Park at lower right

From Newport, we motored down the coast highway about 2-1/2 hours to Charleston, Oregon to one of our favorite RV parks: “Oceanside”. We call our stay up in this area “Coos Bay”, but the actual RV park is just a couple miles south of the Charleston harbor.

Lot’s of seafood restaurants here

The RV park is right adjacent to a wonderful, sandy beach (Bastendorff) that the dogs love, and has a big rock spit that extends out into the ocean. Very pretty, with lots of tide pools, too.

Right near Bastendorff Beach
Sunset Beach, just down the road

We were pleasantly surprised when we got to the park and realized that the new owners are re-landscaping the entire place…it was a bit rundown…and it’s looking great. The new owners must have listened to campers, because most of the stuff on my wish list for this place is being addressed. The gravel roadways have been replace with asphalt, which has eliminated the dust problem that they had here. The laundry room is the only sore spot now: both washing machines are “down” right now. Supposedly, they will be replaced this Summer.

One of our good friends from Sun City Mesquite, neighbor Sandy Rose, and her dog, Greta, stayed with us for six days…and were wonderful guests. The three adults enjoyed alcoholic beverages on the patio, shopped in town, ate at some nice restaurants (note: Sandy treated us to an upscale meal at a downtown Coos Bay joint named “O”…it was GOOD!), played cards, and solved world problems.

Saint Charlie
Craig, trying on a goofy hat
This is Sandy, enjoying a drink

After Sandy left, we had the opportunity to pal up with some other extended stay folks like ourselves: Bruce and Barbara Newman. They are full-time RV’ers, like Dan and Peggy Quinn, and they also winter in Yuma, like the Quinns.

Bruce and Barbara are about our age. They are originally from New York (Queens, I think), and Barbara sounds just like Edith Bunker from “All In The Family”. They have children and grandchildren, along with all the drama that that entails…so we had stories to share. And, they travel with three dogs like us, one of which is a Boston Terrier named “Buster”. Our six dogs got along great.

Here we are at Miller’s By The Cove:

We had a great couple of weeks hanging around with the Newmans. We shared lots of stories each day, sitting in our patio area, doing what retired people do, bitching and moaning about the cost of living, our latest medical ailments, and stupid things that we’ve done or seen. Bruce was once an electrician, but later in life made a career change to Orthopedic Tech, and Barbara was a bookkeeper for general contractors, I believe. So, with Charlie’s and my background, we had lots of stories to tell.

The four of us rescued some young folks one day. McKenzie and Anthony were camping here, in a tent, I think. When they went to leave, McKenzie’s Toyota overheated, right near us. The four of us invited then into our patio lair, gave them things to eat and drink, and spent a couple of hours with them while their car cooled down. I put some antifreeze in the radiator to help out. Finally, when they were done enjoying our food, drink, and marijuana, they took off. What a nice couple!

(BTW, McKenzie’s grandmother has been married 14 times! She even married a guy who was in prison and divorced him before he got out!!)

My new friend Bruce Newman is a 70-ish stoner: he’s either smoking a joint, has just finished one, or has just ingested a THC-laced cookie. Barbara says that he’s been doing dope since he was 16. Anyway, he’s pretty mellow, friendly, and always cracking corny jokes. And, always offering a toke or Alice B Toklas cookie, with the advisory, “Just try a small portion!”

I got talked into making some THC-laced chocolate chip cookies. Bruce and I got some marijuana distillate at the dispensary (90 percent THC), I mixed it up with some Betty Crocker cookie mix, and I proceeded to make 3 small batches…about 30 cookies in all.

“Just eat a portion!”

I got caught up in the production of the cookies, forgot that they had “medicine” in them, and threw down a cooled, runt cookie while I was putting the last batch in the convection oven. Oh, Boy, was that a mistake! I became totally wasted within an hour, and had to lay down on the bed… hallucinating. That’s where Charlie found me about 90 minutes later, when she returned from shopping with Barbara. I was zapped, of no use to anyone, for the rest of the afternoon and evening. Holy Shit, that stuff was powerful!

Mr. Stoner (i.e. Bruce) saved my ass yesterday. A hydraulic strut that helps close one of the under-the-coach equipment storage bays broke, and was in a very awkward position to repair. I couldn’t figure out how to get at the problem with the limited tools at my disposal. Bruce, using his THC-stimulated imagination, somehow disengaged the strut, allowing me to close the bay door. He receives a Cheech Marin “Three Thumbs Up!” commendation on that one. I will have it fixed when we get home.

The only downside of our Coos Bay stay has been Jay Jay’s persistent bowel issues. He’s had un-firm poos for three months now, and we’ve tried everything. Jay is definitely getting old (he’ll be 14 in October), and his hearing and eyesight are failing somewhat. And, his normal enthusiasm…except at chow time. We are going to hook up with Dr. Black in Murrieta, once we set up down in Oceanside (Southern California) in early September. I just hope Jay Jay doesn’t get any worse by then.

Our next two stops, Brookings, Oregon and Crescent Bay, California will be new to us. I hope they are as nice as Coos Bay, and I hope we can meet some new friends there, as well.

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