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| Watching The Sunset |
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| Case And Emerson |
One October when the kids were young, sometime in the late
seventies, we spent several days at the Boy Scouts of America Camp Meriwether
on the Oregon Coast. As a Scout
Committee Member, I was able to rent a staff cabin whenever the camp was not
being used by multiple scout troupes.
(October was a good month for finding open weekends)
We were there the weekend of October eighteenth and
experienced perfect weather. We
discovered also that the conditions for finding mushrooms was also
perfect. While hiking through the
forested area we found several patches of Chanterelle mushrooms. For several years thereafter we planned
a yearly outing at the beach around October the eighteenth and found the
weather and mushrooms hunting to most always be wonderful.
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| Hurrying To The Beach |
We haven’t rented a cabin at Camp Meriwether for over thirty
years but we have been faithful at holding our yearly family reunion on the
Oregon Coast around October the eighteenth. Mushroom hunting has not always been part of the reunion but
we have almost always been blessed with good weather.
This year’s reunion was held one weekend earlier than the
eighteenth. We have rented houses
at various resort areas. The past
three years the family has rented at Bella Beach. This was the first time for Norma and me as we have been
gone for the past two years. The forecast was for heavy rain on Friday,
Saturday and Sunday. Our plans
could not be changed but that was OK.
Each of our reunions has always been a magical time and we were sure
this would not be any different.
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| Grandma with Dakota,Emerson,Cohen |
Many of us left Portland around twelve noon. Some left around two-thirty and the
rest started their trip after five o’clock. All of us were able to travel in the sunshine. The early
travelers got settled in their respective houses and then hurried down to the
beach.
It was a warm and sunny late afternoon. The waves were high and pounding on the
beach. The sun was getting low in
the sky and the shadows were long.
It couldn’t have been better.
It was getting close to dinnertime. Lis and Nathan had prepared a
wonderful Potato Bar but no one wanted to leave the beach. It would have to
wait while we enjoyed the sunset.
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| The Cousins Testing The Waves |
It takes three houses to accommodate our family. Thirty bodies when we are all
assembled; however, this year Kirsten could not be with and Jake is still on
his mission, so we were only twenty-eight. There was an average of two to three families in each house;
however, only one of the houses was large enough to accommodate all of us at mealtime. So we all gathered in the yellow “Saltbox”
house. We ate the potato bar in
shifts because the later groups had not arrived yet. After the little ones were bedded down the grown-ups chatted
and played some games.
The weather on Friday lived up to the forecast. The Zariwny’s served a French toast
breakfast; Kitta served a unique rice bowl lunch, with beans, avocados, salsa
and Yummi sauce. We ate Bo and
Teresa’s pulled pork and coleslaw sandwiches with regular and sweet potato
French fries for dinner. The
dinner dessert was furnished by McAllister and Denita. In between we watched the rain and
played games. Later in the
afternoon we drove into Lincoln City to visit a glass blowing shop. It was an interesting rainy day
activity.
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| Watching The Glassblowing |
Saturday was a cloudy but dry day. We drove down the coast toward Newport. We stopped along the way to do some
beach hopping. We built some sand
castles and did some “boogieboarding”.
We stopped by the Hatfield Science Center to pet the octopus. The kids touched many other sea
creatures and manipulated the wave tank.
After visiting the many other exhibits we drove back to Bella Beach for
a Spaghetti dinner prepared by Tova and Jeff. Earlier in the day grandma and grandpa served a waffle
breakfast and we ate a taco salad lunch by Karen.
On Sunday we had a breakfast of funeral potatoes,
fall-off-the-bone baked ham and bread pudding. We cleaned up the three houses and deposited the keys before
starting the drive home. It was
another cloudy but dry day. We
allowed the kids to spend some time on the beach before driving inland.
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| Glassblowing |
As you can see, we were blessed with one sunny afternoon,
one rainy day and one and-a-half cloudy but dry days. So much for the forecast of three rainy days producing eight
inches of water.
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| Octopus |
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| Ocean View To The Beach |
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| A Warm Sunny Day |
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| Some Wanted To Stay Dry |
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| Staying In Out Of The Rain |
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| Cloudy But Dry |
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| Mother And Son Acting Silly |
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| Simon "Boogieboarding" |
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| Quentin, Ali, Kyton And Toby |
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| Kyton, Dakota And Ali |
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| Emerson and Cohen |
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| Campfire Smores |
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| Kitta, Cohen And Karen |
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| Touching The Sea Creatures |
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| Simon Watches The Wave Tank |
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| Cousins Running From The Waves |
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| Down To The Beach |
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| Ben And Zach Stacks Rocks |
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| Rocks On driftwood |
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| Eating Again |
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| Rainy Day Activity |
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| Going To The House For Food |
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| A Walk At Bella Beach |
Bye for now,
Norma and Gary
