August 30, 2009
Cannon Beach, OR
We made the easy drive from Forks to Cannon Beach today and were rewarded with - more road construction. We had 14 miles of chip sealing south of Forks and 44 miles of it south of Queets on US-101 in Washington. Chip sealing is a process where they spread a layer of asphalt covered by loose stone chips to put a new surface on a road. It's way easier (and cheaper, of course) than new blacktop, but it's a stop-gap treatment at best. They do nothing to eliminate frost heaves (yes, US-101 is full of them which surprised me since I though the climate was too moderate here for that) and create a rough surface that increases road noise and throws small rocks everywhere. With the cover on the car, we're relatively safe from damage.
All in all, it was a reasonably nice drive. The weather was cool and cloudy but it didn't rain. The scenery was mostly forested, with a lot of logging having been done over the years. Whole swaths of the trees are of "different vintages" as they've been harvested and replanted at different times. There was even an area where hurricane-force winds took out a lot of trees in 2007; those were harvested as well.
The sun came out for a few minutes as we came to the mouth of the Columbia River. We had a nice view as we crossed the tall bridge into Astoria, Oregon, and enjoyed pointing out a few sites we saw when we did this drive in the fall of 1993 (surprised that memory still works!).
We arrived in Cannon Beach on schedule, except that I turned right instead of left getting off the 101, so we had a slight detour through part of town before we got settled. I apparently didn't ask enough questions when I made the reservation since we got a 30-amp site instead of 50-amp, but we'll survive. With temperatures in the upper-60s, we certainly don't need the air conditioning!
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