Newport, Oregon - Ahhh, the beach

What a beautiful campground we are lucky to be in! Thousand Trails Whalers Rest in Newport, Oregon. There are trees, but not too many. Lots of ferns and wildflowers. With the ocean shining through the trees and the sound of the waves crashing on shore, we have arrived! There is a short path to the highway, and then the beach. Just be careful crossing that highway! I could stay here for our 3 week allowance, but there are some other TTN/NACO/LTR campgrounds we would like to visit before settling in for the summer in Montana. So we will enjoy this little piece of peace for a week or so.

Thursday morning we stopped by the Allison Transmission service center in Coburg for the 5,000 mile tranny filter replacement. We're not quite at 5K miles, but we will be in the middle of no where (Montana) when we get to 5K. I called Allison at 7 AM, was there by 8 AM and they were finished by 10 AM. Rick finished up with the paperwork at Guaranty RV and met me at Allison. After a painless $70 charge and a few cups of their coffee, we hooked up the CR-V to the moho and drove about 120 miles or 2 1/2 hours on scenic Hwy 20 across to the coast. The road was curvy and 2 lanes most of the way, but nice.

We settled into our campsite and then headed to the beach for the afternoon. All of the waiting around for the past 4 weeks was washed away by the waves, literally. If you know Rick, you know that he was soon in the water, not body surfing like the teenager Rick, but up to his shorts.

There were a number of people walking bent over looking at the small rocks on the shore, every once in a while bending down to examine a gem of a rock. We knew from our visit to Thousand Trails South Jetty in Florence just south of here that rock collecting is a popular past time on the Oregon coast. We are rock hounds from the '80's and enjoy looking and finding beautiful rocks. We found a lot of agates and quartz the size of cherries, a few as big as a golf ball. They're yellow, orange, clear, gold, and the elusive blue. There aren't many shells and only a few pieces of broken glass. There is also jasper and lots of fossilized clams and snails. Relaxed and happy, with our pockets filled with gems, we headed back for a late dinner.