#Travel: Cornering #Oregon – #photography

Oregonians know well the distinctive shape of their state. It’s found on key chains, souvenir shot glasses, business logos, decorative plates and innumerable wood-carved thingies. I feel bad for states like Colorado that have an outline about as exciting as a rectangle.

Colorado, Wyoming and Utah are the only states which have boundaries defined solely by lines of latitude and longitude. (Thanks for the arcane knowledge, Wikipedia!)

After hearing about all of the sunny and warmer days that have been happening on the Oregon coast, this weekend my wife and I decided to go see for ourselves. The plan was to leave cold and foggy Portland behind and go all the way around the NW corner of that unique Oregon shape.

Here are a few photographs from the trip. I’ve left them full-size to they can be clicked to enlarge.

The Portland Oregon skyline on the way out of town.

We headed north out of town followed the Oregon side of Columbia River. Sometime after passing the town of Rainier and a big ass bridge, we pulled over and found some ancient ruins.

I assume, of course, these were built by aliens. Even google seems to have no information.

The ruins weren’t far from this river shack. Maybe the occupant knows the history? But duck mating sounds came from within so we gave the place a wide berth.

Looks like some freshwater shellfish.

Arriving in Astoria, we immediately loaded up on fish and chips at the classiest boat-based food cart we could find. The Bowpicker! Our stomachs were about to embark on a three-hour tour, a three-hour tour.

Here we see the Astoria Column as viewed from a distance. As a child my parents once tried to force me up this thing. Naturally I cried like a baby and was excused. I’ve never been to the top. I hear there’s a cast iron spiral staircase that takes people 125′ to the top. It was built by a relative of John Jacob “Jack” Astor IV who died famously in the Titanic disaster. (That has nothing to do with our trip, though.)

This is a big boat that was floating in the Columbia River.

This is a smaller boat that seriously took a wrong turn. Maybe they had the fish and chips.

This part of the Columbia River is extremely close to the mouth that feeds the Pacific Ocean. There were lots and lots of these big ugly monstrosities ruining what otherwise would have been an awesome view. Lewis and Clarke and the Corps of Discovery came through here once and probably saw less of these things.

After a brief stop in Seaside, Oregon, which is essentially a tourist trap with one massively clogged street and lots of empty streets, we hurried south, finally arriving at Cannon Beach. I was heard to exclaim, “Where the hell is it?”

The sea was angry that day, my friends. (Not really, but it kind of looks like it.) Off in the distance you could see Tillamook Rock Light, a now deactivated lighthouse, nicknamed Terrible Tilly, probably because someone decided to built it on a rock offshore. Construction took 500 days.

The quintessential tourist shot of Cannon Beach and Haystack Rock. In 1846 a cannon washed ashore, but I’m sure that has nothing to do with the name.

Oregonians like to bike everywhere.

Suddenly eye felt like eye was being watched.

It was a baby bunny rabbit.

Finis.