Flown by two famous aviators
One thing I’ve noticed about the back roads in Oregon is the lack of any shoulders. Only inches from the edge of the blacktop and lane marker the ground falls almost vertical to a deep ditch or dropoff. There is hardly any place to safely pull off the highway. In the event you are startled by a deer, or nudged over by a large truck in your lane, or suddenly had a flat tire, you would surly suffer a calamity of great proportions down some unearthly embankment. Even when the road is on the level the builders decided to raise the grade six feet to make sure there were dropoff on either side. If you showed any normal, highway superintendent a section of this road, they would ponder only a second and say, “We should put a guardrail along here.”
All this got me to thinking today as I drove back to the coast from the Aviation and Space Museum in McMinnville, OR. The road over the coastal mountains was smooth but curvy and narrow. I was going the speed limit but several cars would pile up behind me anyway. If I’m going the speed limit I usually don’t worry to much about holding up traffic, but after a while I want to pull over and let them go by before someone gets too impatient and tries to pass on a curve. It sometimes was many miles before I could find a good place to pull over.
More airplanes
The museum in McMinnville is where the Spruce Goose, Howard Hughes gigantic wooden airplane is kept on display. It was a little expensive to get into the museum but worth it. Not only is the Spruce Goose on display but hundreds of other aircraft and rockets. I spent four hours wandering through the place. You can see inside Hughes plane but it cost an extra $25 to go up to the flight deck and sit where Howard flew the plane.
STOL airplane
I’m back over on the coast near Florence. It has been raining today so I have been hiding, but maybe tomorrow I will check out the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area. I have come half way down through Oregon. My plan is to continue slowly down the coast and then gradually ease up on the pace.
I’ve driven in Oregon, but don’t remember the lack of road shoulders. Of course, I was in a car, so that makes a big difference. Don’t hurry back to Arizona. Even though we had a few days with temps in the 80s, it’s headed back up to the high 90s this weekend and all next week.
You’re close to the area we thought about buying a lot. Just south of Reedsport is Winchester Bay and the Umpqua Lighthouse. If you haven’t been to one along the coast yet, it’s a good one to visit. The tour takes you up into it to see the lens. This is great motorcycle country. We rode over here a couple times from Sutherlin.
Wasn’t the Spruce Goose in Long Beach when you lived here? I know it was when I moved here in 1987 but it wasn’t long after that it went up to Oregon. I did see it while it was here. I don’t think they charged that much to go into the cockpit then if at all.
Yes. We saw it when it was there, and it was not nearly as expensive, but that was a long time ago . If you really want to make me feel old — I watched the Queen Mary arrive under its own power when it came to Long Beach to become a tourist attraction. We were on Ocean Blvd. waiting for it, and it was a foggy day. Suddenly it appeared out of the mist. Kind of cool.