Cape Disappointment, Washington Cape Disappointment State Park 6/28 - 7/2 2019

From: casarollnotes.blogspot.com 

Tim and Linda Bunyan

We are at the Washington State, Cape Disappointment State Park while we focus on the destination of Lewis & Clark Corps of Discovery Expedition, the first American expedition to cross the western portion of the United States.  (5/14/1804 - 9/23/1985).

Cape Disappointment could not be explored by ship as the river's entrance was not locaed.  English Captain John Meares, 1788, named the headland Cape Disappointment located at the north side of the Columbia River, two miles southwest of the town of Ilwaco.

We set out along the Colombia River (North Side).  From the Station Camp (abandoned Indian Village) to Dismal Point.

  The below pic is the autual site Lewis and Clark climbed to view the Pacific Ocean.

  View to the Pacific.  Statement by Lewis "What a Handsome Sight"!  He worked (1801 - 1803)  for then President Thomas Jefferson as his personal secretary.

WE retraced their trail along the Colombia River as they arrived the mouth of the river.  It rained everyday.  The Corp could not cross the River.  They went ashore in a small cove, Capt William Clark called "that dismal little nitch.  Severe winter storm struck the area forcing them off the river for six days and preventing them from meeting the suplly ships.: 

Dismal Nitch is now a Rest Area.

This lady was raising money for the local Food Bank taking donations by offering Coffee and Cookies.

Station Camp, the last camp the Corp made on their journey.

The natives gifted their boat.  This boat was highly desireable to Lewis and Clark to cross the Columbia River.

 This Station Camp the Corps decided where to spend the winter.  They considered the climate, the possibility of an exploring or trading ship visiting the mouth of the Columbia and the availability of game and the salt to cure it.

Nearby the Long Beach Peninsula and a four-mile long bridge to Astoria, Oregon, Fort Columbia is in a secluded area.  There is a museum, spectacular views, cozy two-story building, refurbished open as a B&B.

Located on Chinook Apoint at the mouth of the Columbia

Artilery batteries and picnicking facilities make for interesting history and compelling place to be.

Fishing town at the mouth of the Columbia River: Ilwaco.

 Fishing Fleet

 Waterfront shops and restaurants at the Marina.

We head for the beach: Long Beach, north of the Cape.  From the street onto the large beach everyone enjoying the fresh ocean air and the waves and lots of beach space.!

Sand tire Bikes and Eagles.

 People with their Dogs play at the beach.

 Tim and I walking on the beach.  The background point of land is the Cape area and the uppermost mountain Lewis and Clark climbed to view the Pacific Ocean.........No vehicles on the beach then when they looked to the North. Just a journal notation of a long beach......28 miles of beach!!!

 North Head Lighthouse

We depart Lewis & Clark Corp of Discovery area.  They stayed on the other side (near Astoria) which was our previous stop.  The Columbia River still rules in strength challending ships to this day.

We are heading north.  We are going to stop to visit my cousin Colleen and Gary and their son, Tommy and daughter Melissa in Ocean Shores for the 4th of July holiday.  Colleen and Gary frequent their ocean shores house as a Family Tradition having built and owned it for over 20 years.

We drive thru Hoquiam, Washington a town where I lived in my second grade and half of my third grade before we moved as a family to California.

 Along the highway; timber industry remains.

Onward to Ocean Shores, Washington!

Astoria, Oregon Fort Stevens State Park 6/21 - 6/28 2019

From: casarollnotes.blogspot.com 

Tim and Linda Bunyan

Fort Stevens State Park, Oregon at the mouth of the Columbia River to the Pacific Ocean.

Arrived in the area where Lewis & Clark choose to spend the Winter of 1805 once they had proven the passageway by water from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean.

"Looking Out Our Back Door"

Fort Stevens State Park in Oregon:  We went on a 10-mile bike ride around the park.  

This is the only Civil War era earthen fort on the west coast.  This is the concrete artillery gun batteries that remain as a World War II command center.  The primary military defense installation fort was in service from the Civil War to World War II.  

 These tents demonstrate war-time barracks; assembled here for the weekend for the education of it all!

 
















Lots of Fun at the Beach

Tim and I at a Ranger Program about the Wreck of the Peter Iredale ship.  Four-masted steel barque sailing vessel that ran ashore.

  The front bow remains.

We drive a few miles east into the port city of Astoria, Oregon founded 1811.  It is the oldest American settlement west of the Rocky Mountains and the oldest city in the state of Oregon.
  On the drive to town, we passed by a local marina with this 
a simple sign to pay for dock moorage (Charge Card Machine).

Astoria is charming and authentic 

Downtown 1920s Venetian Vaudeville Liberty Theatre and cinema remains open showing first-run movies and a playhouse theatre and events center.

 The entire town is a National Register Historic District.  Astoria is also the western terminus of the TransAmerica Bicycle Trail, a 4,250 miles coast-to-coast bicycle touring route created in 1976 by the Adventure Cycling Association.  We plan to continue our Travel Tours by RV !!!

The 'serious music store' sells DVDs, musical instruments & repair, albums, coffee, 

and plants.

Most of the town is built going uphill to the waterfront.

 Located on the corner of the main street and the harbor, this Custard King is a fun ice cream stop we found....a couple of times~!!

Sign to the Bowpicker Fish and Chips.

"The Bowpicker" in business for 19 years famous and best Fish and Chips from Eureka, CA to Astoria, Oregon !!!  The line to the bowpicker boat (referred to us by friends Nina and Paul-WheelingIt) serving fish and chips in the alley at Main street.  Order and take away to dine at a few picnic table scattered about.

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 The Street view of Harbor and Main Street from the Bowpicker picnic table.

 Sears is open here in downtown Astoria.

HARBOR and WATERFRONT
We discovered the Cannery at the far end of town (not the Cannery Pier Hotel and Spa); the real cannery from days gone by!  

Founded in 1899 by dedicated fishermen.  in 1899 a group of 7 canners in Astoria formed CRPA Columbia River Packers Association. and founded U.S. leading brands: Bumble Bee Seafoods.

Work is our Joy! 

The Rogue Brewery has an establishment connected to the historic Cannery building.  Still open for business! 

 Crab Co. sells T-shirts......and fresh crab by the crab or meat by the pound! 
 $40.00 per pound here in Astoria!  

This is the wharf building where the cannery workers process salmon that the local fishermen with their bowpicker boat, brought into the Cannery. 















Tim strolls through the museum; bowpicker boats used by the local fishermen

Bowpickers

 

Coffee shop and wharf entrance from the cannery.  Nothing has changed...
.even this furniture piece in the restroom. 

Coffee Cafe has a window view at the dock of the Columbia River; note the large freight liner in the harbor waiting for a Pilot Boat escort out the mouth of the Columbia River into the Pacific Ocean!

PILOT BOAT

Pilot Boats Private Dock.  An elite Columbia River Bar Pilots club of highly attained and licensed pilots that know the Columbia River Harbor whose job it is to ensure the safety of ships, crews and cargoes crossing the treacherous Columbia River Bar, which is one of the most dangerous and challenging navigated stretches of water in the world.

The official Oregon state Maritime Museum.

 Here is the Lightship Columbia on display in the harbor.  Built by Rice Brothers Corporation, Boothbay, Maine.  Diaphone foghorn.  The final lightship stationed at the mouth of the Columbia River.  The lightship guided vessels across the Columbia River Bar and an area known as the Graveyard of the Pacific from 1892 - 1979.  Replaced by an automated navigational buoy; now retired and added to the National Register of Historic Places at the Columbia River Maritime Museum.

The United States Coast Guard is the coastal defense and maritime law enforcement branch of the United States Armed Forces.  It operates under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. 

Travel the broad waters of the Columbia River from Astoria to Portland's harbor on a 100 mile, 7 day Travel Tour.  Retracing the route of Lewis & Clark!
Astoria has served as a port of entry for over a century and remains the trading center for the lower Columbia basin.

Captain George Flavel, a maritime pilot, and businessman.
The Flavel House built in 1885 in Queen Anne architectural by George Flavel, 
a Columbia River bar pilot.

Baby crib.  

Soaker tub; he was one of the area's first millionaires.

 

"Mud Room" next to the kitchen. 

We have kept Tim's highchair from when he was a baby; now over 60 years old...an antique.  This is from the early 1900's used by George Flavel's two daughters.

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Backyard gardens and carriage house.  He was a well-respected family man and businessman.

Other local scenes:  1847 John Shively was appointed Postmaster of Astoria, the first Post Office west of the Rocky Mountains.  (L&C came blazed the trail: 1805).

Hudson's Bay Company coat of arms ' "a skin for a skin."
The Hudson's Bay Company chartered in 1670, the oldest incorporated joint-stock merchandising company in the English-speaking world.  HBC was a fur trading business for most of its history.  It now owns and operates retail stores in Canada, the U.S., and parts of Europe, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany.  Subsidiaries: Hudson's Bay, 
Lord & Taylor, Saks Fifth Avenue, 
and Home Outfitters, and others.



1926
The Astoria Column, a tower 125' high, built atop Coxcomb Hill above the town.  We climbed the inner circular staircase to see a panoramic view of the town and surrounding lands.

Built in 1926 by the Great Northern Railway and  Vincent Astor,
 the great-grandson of Business and Finance of the Early Republic: Fur trader and real estate investor: Founder of an American fur trade dynasty: John Jacob Astor.  He came to the U.S. to seek his fortune in 1784.  He traveled from New York to the wilderness to procure furs for his shop in NY.  A few years later made his first real estate investment: the outpost: Astoria.


 West View of the town of Astoria-Megler Bridge, spanning the lower Columbia River, between Astoria, Oregon, and Point Ellice near Megler, Washington.  
Fort Clatsop on far left is where Lewis & Clark stayed for the Winter of 1805.
The place where Lewis & Clark viewed the Pacific Ocean is across the bridge in WA on the far right.

Looking South, Saddle Mountain, from where the Youngs River flows (forms a bay) 
to the mouth of the 
Columbia River. 

The grounds at The Column., 

 2019: We flew (tossed out the window) from the top of the Column a balsa wood airplane; stayed airborne for about 10 minutes till touched the ground below.  On our drive out from the grounds, we picked it up. 
 It remains in our RV museum.





FORT CLATSOP
L&C Expedition spent the winter of 1805-`1806 at the historical park at Fort Clatsop.

Sacagawea, a Lemhi Shoshone.  The only female member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Pacific in 1804-1806.
Reenactment of Lewis & Clark at their fort.  They built it for the Winter during their stay before heading back to St. Louis, Missouri.  The single shot rifle could kill deer and elk, but it would take several bullets and several men to put down a bear!

Lewis & Clark River.  This provided fresh water and wildlife. 

Red Elderberries; pretty but do not partake of the seeds...poisonous!  Not generally eater these days; blue elderberry is grown and used to make jelly and wine in the Willamette Valley.  Birds do eat them.

 The Lewis and Clark river was used to float logs down from the mountains to the Astoria Harbor to be shipped out.  These pilings were used to help guide the logs in moveable formation down the river to be sorted, then bundled, and pushed onto rafts (a raft was about the length of 3 football fields 
to ports along the Columbia 
or for the export market.

The Sealed Cache in honor of the Corp of Discovery Lewis and Clark

Time to move on from Fort Clatsop, Oregon to cross the Astoria-Megler Bridge over the mouth of the Columbia River to our next stop where Lewis & Clark actually claimed their reaching
 the sight of the Pacific !!!