OFF TO CHEHALIS, WA

August 17 – 19, 2010



We bid farewell to the Salits, the Lacys and to TTN Sunriver and headed North to the Portland area, retracing our route south except this time it was a beautiful, clear, sunny day with magnificent views of the surrounding mountains. We passed through Bend, Redmond and then Madras on the way but ahead was the south slope of Mt. Hood which we could now see clearly in all its magnificence.

Hwy 97 toward Mt. Hood

But, before we left Sunriver we received an email from Beau Speed who mentioned that they would be staying at a park in Troutdale, OR, with old friends from Mississippi who had flown out to join them for a couple weeks of travel. Since we planned to stay at the Wal-Mart parking lot in Wood Village nearby, we made plans to meet for dinner that evening.


By shopping at Fred Meyer’s stores, Fran had accumulated a coupon for 10 cents per gallon off of fuel purchased at a Fred Meyer gas station. Now, we seldom use supermarket gas stations since they are usually crowded and difficult to maneuver a motorhome, especially when towing a car behind. However, at $2.99 per gallon of diesel fuel less 10 cents less our 5% discount on our credit card, it all came to a deal we just couldn’t refuse. So although we did hold up a few cars while we filled our 100 gallon tank, people were more interested in chatting about the coach to get too annoyed.

Now that's Mt. Hood!

When we arrived at the Wal-Mart store in Wood Village we found a very unusual heat wave had the temperature up to 94 degrees, too hot to stay in the coach that night without air conditioning so after lunch at our Old Country Deli, we visited Gartner’s Meat Market again for a couple pounds of their famous marinated beef riblets and then the obligatory stop at the Camping World store and grocery shopping at Wal-Mart, it was off to the Elks Lodge in Vancouver again, complete with electricity to operate our A/C.

We made arrangements to meet the Speeds and their friends, Bobby and Marilyn Quinn, at the Edgefield Power Station Grill that evening. Edgefield was once an Old Folks Home for the County that had been converted into a hotel, restaurants, wine shop, and various artisan shops including a glass blowing shop and a blacksmith shop. It is an interesting place to spend the day or just a few hours. We certainly enjoyed meeting with the Speeds and Quinns and had a rollicking good time trading humor with our new “old south” friends.

Early Wednesday morning on our way out of the Elks Lodge campground we passed the motorhomes of Danny & Marcie Quarisa and Earl & Marie McPeak, also staying at the Elks Lodge. Danny is the past president of the CAT RV Club but it was a little early to be knocking on doors, so we continued on northbound to the Thousand Trails Preserve at Chehalis, WA. We would only stay there for one night but since we had not been there before we thought it would be interesting to look it over. The Preserve is like most others in the Northwest, very hilly and too heavily wooded, but it was well cared for and had a few sites with sewers. Although the friendly ranger at the gate said that our chances of getting a sewer site were slim to none, we managed to find a very nice clearing where we found a site with a sewer that allowed Fran to catch up on our laundry and housekeeping chores. No Satellite TV but we did get local TV and found out the local news.

Thursday morning we would be off to the Tacoma Elks Lodge to meet up with Fran’s Fort Bragg grammar and junior high school buddy, Louise, whom she hadn’t seen in many years. So, until then, that will be all for now. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bye!