This weekend we had a dilemma – finish organizing the garage or head to the coast? We did have new Oregon State Park Passes to break in…
We headed to Tillamook, OR (known for their delightful assortment of cheese that can be found at your local dairy case) with plans to check out the beaches and parks in the surrounding areas. One of those beaches was Oceanside. Within a few minutes we had both claimed it as “our favorite Oregon beach. So far.” Who can argue with picturesque seaweed, large haystack rocks protruding from the ocean, a large population of puffins, and a small tunnel carved through a cliff that leads to a secluded piece of beach heaven?
Further down the map, we pulled off on a wayside along the road to turn the car around. The little wayside ended up having a pretty spectacular view of Oceanside, the bay, and some State Park coast. While at the little wayside, another car pulled up. Having seen too many movies where seclusion in nature turns horribly wrong, coupled with an over-active imagination, I quickly sized-up our new wayside companions. While weighing our fight or flight options, I noticed their car had Minnesota plates. And the young man climbing out of the car was wearing a St. Cloud State t-shirt. Wait a second… We are from Minnesota too!!!
After establishing our midwestern bond, the mother of this mother/son duo (mother is originally from Portland) had her son retrieve a “must have” from their car. She was prepared to introduce us to our new state and had just the thing to do it – a pictorial map on the back of a laminated, souvenir placemat! She excitedly explained that this map represented whole state of Oregon and highlighted scenic landmarks found around the state. Instead of pesky labeled roads and listed cities found on “mainstream” maps, this map focused on landmarks - each represented with a convenient, flash card-like illustration. For example, let’s say you want to visit the lobster (which could single-handedly wipe out Manhattan, given its scale in comparison to the lighthouse), simply drive south of the cow and hang a right at the smiling otter. Minnesota mother pointed out that our travels that day had taken us from the big cheese wedge (Tillamook), past the three brown blobs (Oceanside), down to the slouching pelican (Pacific City). Plot your route AND protect your table from spills – pure genius.
On our way back to the city, we stopped at the Tillamook factory for some much-hyped ice cream (Dave had Oregon strawberry, I had caramel toffee crunch), while we made plans for future trips to jumbo-size pear, happy lumberjack, and other scenic characters this state has in store.
