August 1, 2012                   Day 54                                   Hope, BC to Joint Base Lewis/McChord, WA

The drive out of Canada was bittersweet. We are all glad to be heading back home to our kitties and friends. However, we are sad that our grand adventure is coming to an end.

We took the same route out of Canada through the same sleepy border crossing. This time there wasn’t any interesting people watching. I don’t know if the border guard really doesn’t like his job or if he had his “game face” on, but he seemed a little surly. Maybe he is upset at being stationed at little Sumas, WA. Anyway, after a few questions, he sent us on our way.

Both in Canada and northern Washington we drove past many berry bushes. The only ripe ones were on farm land/private property. Too bad, I think Mike would have liked to stop to pick some more.

After the bucolic farms and back road highways, Interstate 5 was a bit of a shock. The drivers here don’t seem to care about cutting of trucks or trailers and seem to weave in and out of traffic a lot. We hit Seattle at noon and had a few slowdowns but at least we missed the rush hours.

We arrived at Ft. Lewis (last time we stayed at McChord) to get our guest passes. It was extra crowded since today was the ROTC graduation so check in took longer. From here we went straight to the food court at the PX/BX. The boys were really looking forward to some fast food. Too bad for them, the food court didn’t have a Burger King so they had to settle for a slice of pizza.

We did a little shopping and Rick and the boys got haircuts. I love Rick’s new haircut. It is really short and he said it is easy to maintain. Luca got a buzz but not too short. Dominic just got the edges cleaned up and a little off the top. Now they are ready for school. Luca may need another cut before school starts. We’ll see.

We had to exit the base and reenter across the freeway at the Northwest Adventure Center/Travel Camp. There was a bit of a mix up about which sites we could fit in, but we ended up in a nice quiet back in not far from the grandparents’ pull through. After dinner Rick and I walked with the boys to check out the lake. It is a nice enough lake but the swimming area is across the lake from the camping. How does that make sense? We saw some geese and what may have been an immature bald eagle.

Tomorrow we head to the Oregon coast and Highway 101.

August 2, 2012                   Day 55                   Ft. Lewis, WA to Lincoln City, OR

Well, today didn’t turn out like I thought. I was so looking forward to a drive along the coast. Instead, we went down I-5 straight through Portland. We (mostly Rick) had to deal with crazy drivers and stop and go traffic. It all worked for the best in my opinion because if we hadn’t gone this route we wouldn’t have stumbled upon a gem of a museum complex in Evergreen, OR. We don’t have a Milepost (or any literature at all) about this part of the trip so we had no idea what we would see.

We were looking for a place to have lunch when we came around a bend in the highway (no longer on the 5). There were huge glass buildings proclaiming Space and Aviation Museum and wings and Waves Waterpark. I had seen billboards for this during the day but didn’t know where Evergreen was or if we would make any stops. We pulled into the parking lot for lunch.

After lunch the DiMaios unanimously voted to try out the museums. Mom and Mike weren’t up to it due to various maladies. They voted to head on to the campground and look for berry picking or antique stores.

Once again our Coyote Point Museum (can’t get used to the new name and can’t spell it) membership got us in for free! That one membership has paid for itself over and over again on this trip alone.  What a value! We started in the Space Museum. It had wonderful displays showing the history of humans in space. It didn’t have a linear layout so I had trouble staying focused and knowing where to go next. There were timelines but they weren’t always apparent, wrapping around corners, etc.

There was a great display about the Mercury 7 astronauts. There was biographical information on each of the men and their contribution to the space program. There was also a return capsule and a spacesuit worn on one of the missions. I can’t remember the exact quote but there was a quote about these men being true heroes. It made me wish for a time when our nation’s heroes were once again scientists, mathematicians, and scholars instead of athletes (although I do love the Olympians) and performers.

There were also old favorites like the personal hover craft thing from Hiller Aviation and a helicopter and reentry capsule from the USS Hornet. The kids never tire of going to the Hornet and when they were little we went to the Hiller Aviation Museum regularly.

Next we walked across to the Aviation Museum. Here I saw an old friend too. The Spruce Goose was now on display here in Evergreen. When I was a teen it was on display in Long Beach near the Queen Mary. I went to see it with my family. A nice docent took our picture with the Spruce Goose in the background. We walked in the cargo hold but didn’t pay the extra $25 each to go into the cockpit and have our picture taken. Howard Hughes was some kind of eccentric genius. He built this huge wooden (actually mostly birch not spruce, but that doesn’t rhyme) plane for WWII and didn’t finish it until 1947 or 1948, well after the war was over. The plane only flew once for about 1 mile at about 70 feet in the air. The plane itself could be taller than 70 feet; the wings alone are 18 feet tall inside. Hughes was concerned about buoyancy so he had a bunch of beach balls inflated and put in the wings and cargo area. Some of them are still there today and still inflated with air from 1947.

There were many other aircraft there from throughout the history of flight. Many of the WWII planes had remarkable stories of survival. For example, one story that stuck with me was a plane shot to pieces, its injured crew limping back to Allied territory when they spotted a German plane. They thought they were done for but instead he provided escort until they were safe. The two pilots found each other later in life and became friends until their death in the same year. When asked why he didn’t shoot them down, the German pilot responded that it wouldn’t have been right to shoot down such brave men. Such a story!

Upstairs there was a firearms section. The thing that struck me from this section was a video about the Second Amendment. It traced the right to bear arms back to at least King George II. Some scholars believe that the North took more casualties during the American Civil War because the southern soldiers already knew how to use their guns whereas the northern soldiers were mostly from the cities and unfamiliar with guns. It was a very compelling and interesting video.

Just before the turn for our campground we finally turned onto 101, but we couldn’t see the ocean! Our campground is in Lincoln City just north of downtown. Mom and Mike had explored downtown and didn’t think we needed to disconnect. Mike offered his truck if we wanted to go to town. Rick rested while I made dinner. After dinner, Luca and I walked over to see the lake. There wasn’t much shore access from this area but we did see a Blue Heron sitting on a post in the lake. Earlier today we saw some osprey sitting in nests on posts in the river along the highway. We are back in hawk and turkey vulture territory so we saw some of those today too.