Coos coos....

Thursday was a day off before our last 3 days of lighthouse duty in September. We kind of lazed around the "house" until mid morning when, at TLE's urging, we decided to drive into at least Bandon to do some junking, and then decide what to do from there.  These are the kind of days I like......just make it up as you go.  We left home around 10:30 am and headed north to Bandon passing through intermittent rain showers along the way......this is Oregon, right?

Our first stop was at the same "thrift" store we visited a couple of weeks ago that I wrote about "here".  This is a great "junk" store, and I was excited to visit it again.  On this particular day TLE found a purse she could not live without.....

Sweet "Reaction" leather purse for TLE...$15

Once we were done browsing through the "junk" store we got back in the VW and continued to the northside of town fully intending to stop in at Ray's Food Place before heading back to the Cape, but I got stuck in the right lane and couldn't turn left into the parking lot....suddenly we find ourselves northbound on US 101 toward Coos Bay.....I look at TLE and say "...looks like we're going to Coos Bay".....she replies...."well, it's only 23 miles....let's do it!".....so we did it.

We first visited Coos Bay back in November of 1978 on a 2 week motorhome trip in a borrowed 1978 Toyota Odyssey which looked a lot like this one.....

Internet photo

That was the trip that essentially lit the fire in my imagination about the nomadic lifestyle....we covered almost 2,100 miles in that 2 week span.....something we would never attempt today, but it was the beginning.  Over the years we have passed through Coos Bay several times as we traveled down the Oregon Coast.

As we trundled northward the rain showers came more frequently, and pretty soon we were in non-stop rain.  We arrived in Coos Bay just before Noon, and wandered over to the Walmart to pick up some things we just can't get at Ray's Food Place (On The Border taco chips for one), and then over to a local Mexican place called Margarita's Mexican Grill.

It had been a few weeks since our Mexican food outing in Bandon, and we had a hankering for some salsa and chips.  We chose Margarita's on the strength of a 4 star rating on Yelp, but personally (I'm not speaking for TLE here) I wouldn't give them much above a 2.5.  I ordered the Chile Relleno.....I've had Chile Relleno's all over the USA, and, for me, this one was sub-par.  The service, ambiance, salsa and chips were good, but that's as far as it went for me.....I liked the food at Rancho Viejo (3.5 stars on Yelp) much better.  On the other hand TLE loved her Chicken Enchilada.

From there we headed over to Fred Meyer's to buy a few more things, and to get our fuel points up over 200 so we could fill our gas tank for the first time in a month using a .20 cent discount....we ended up paying $3.68 per gallon, and in Oregon you don't even have to pump your own gas!

Then it was back south to the Cape where we had a late afternoon date with Chris, Cherie, Nina and Paul to help Chris and Cherie (Tales from Technomadia) pack up their new book, "The Mobile Internet Handbook", for shipment to customers who had pre-ordered the book. Of course there were Margarita's, craft beer, chips, and guacamole to consume along the way, as well as great conversation.  Paul informed me that he had finally found something about me he did not like......my love of the L.A. Dodgers.......(smile).....Paul is a San Francisco Giants fan...so there you go!  Of course it was all in jest, and we had a great time talking about some of the history of the Dodgers/Giants rivalry, College Football, the NFL, long distance hiking and biking, etc.....I wish we had something in common....:D

We arrived at Paul and Nina's a little after 4 and said our "Good Evenings" just before 7:30.  We watched the season premier of "Bones" after watching most of the NY Giants vs. Washington Redskins NFL game.....another great day on Coastal Oregon.

Thanks for stopping by!