Vacation 2010 part two

So anyway, where was I? I think I left off in Southern Oregon. We spent two nights in Port Orford, which was this completely NON-TOURISTY working class port town. The population is like 900, but we made plans to stay there because this woman who we've been corresponding with who made the coast trip last year said the area looked like the Mediterranean. It did too. However, I have to admit, I ENJOY touristy things like hotel swimming pools and Walmart and gift shops and what have you. Port Orford, well, when we approached, was nothing but fog. We found our motel, and I went to check in. Immediately, I get a bad feeling. The owner said "so, are you two couples or what?" and I said, "no, one couple and 4 kids." He gets this panicked look, and asked how old they were. I told him, and assured him I told the woman who took our reservation that we had 4 kids, and that is why she had to charge us 140 dollars for the room. The room we reserved was a suite, so it promised a kitchen, living room, bedroom, and then a loft with another queen bed and two twin beds. He said "my relief help took the reservation. I never put kids in those suites. There are people under you. I hope the kids don't jump....." and he looked all nervous. In the meantime, his cat was jumping all over the place, and he had to blow all the lavender off the counter (??), and I was half expecting him to be wearing a shirt that said "When I grow old, I shall wear purple", but anyway, I went to the room and was so nervous and overworked and we spent a miserable evening trying to keep the kids quiet and planning our escape. Rachel kept saying "WHY are we staying in this town again?" and I was just ready to run for the hills. So, we decided to try and get out of the second night there and move on.
I went to talk to the dude the next morning and he said "oh no, don't leave, just make the best of it, the people didn't complain under you" and he told us what to do. He told us about the port right in front of our room, which was one of 6 in the world, where they lift boats in and out of hte water with cranes, instead of having a harbor. Why, I don't know. But you can drive right on the dock and watch them do this and watch them dump their catch on deck, and anyway, that sounded cool, and it was. I asked about agate hunting, because that's all my wife wanted to do on this trip, and she wasn't having any luck. He told us about this beach called Agate Beach and gave us directions. We ended up spending an entire day there, and it was the most relaxing time. It was well-needed. The kids got to unwind and just play. They spent the day building a fort out of driftwood and Rachel collected buckets of rocks and shells and such. We left briefly, to go for lunch, where I had the best clam chowder of my life (it apparently won an award, too), and we hit the local convenience store for junk food to take back to the beach. It was just so... working class and this creepy dude was talking to the cashier about his love of fantasy novels and he said "it's better than this reality" and it made me feel sad for them. Then this woman came in to buy a pack of Paul Mall 100s, and they were all "WHAT ARE YOU DOING BACK!" and she was all "I came for the weekend - the only good things in this town are the fishing and you honey'!" and then I somehow started joking with them, and then I bought my 66 oz. diet cherry coke, and was on my way. Did I say in my last post about how much fucking pop I drank? Well, everywhere you go, there are fountain drinks, like 66 oz. sized, for 69 cents, so I was always all hopped up on caffeine from them. Oh, and we were complemented on our nice looking family from a couple from Monterey, and they took a family picture for us.
Oh, and then I met my friend. I was walking along the beach with the younger two kids, kind of around the bend from the wife and the other two kids, and this older woman was walking her dog on some rocks by the water. I was leary of getting close to the water there because a man told us how dangerous this beach was and how they lost two women in the spring who were agate hunting and had their backs to the water and got pulled in by sneaker waves and drowned. So anyway, this woman's dog came by me and I petted it and she said something about how nice it was there and I said yes and she said she never knew this beach existed and we got to talking and she was in town for the day because she was teaching a painting class there. She lived like an hour inland and I said how much I loved Oregon and she asked where we were from and where we've been and answered a MILLION questions I had about Oregon and the coast and plants and sea life and I said we were heading to the redwoods and she used to live in California and after she got divorced and moved to Oregon, she had shared custody with her hubby, and they would drop off kids in Eureka, where we were planning to go, so she could answer many questions about there too. SO anyway, she finally gives me her phone number and said to call if we had any more questions, and then gave me her address and said if we found our way through her town, she had two spare bedrooms. She said "it's these serendipity moments that are amazing, hey?" and I thought, yeah, you know, it's true. So I'm going to send her postcards from here.

Anyway, after the long day at the beach, we went to the market and bought a bunch of frozen entres and ate in front of the tv and it was the end of a nice day.Well, ALMOST the perfect end. Because at midnight, when we were getting ready to charge everything, like GPS, camera, etc., we realize.... the charger to the new camera in nowhere to be seen. \

Stay tuned for that gong show in tomorrow's post - it won't disappoint.