North Head Lighthouse - Long Beach, WA

After Christmas nine of us packed up and went to Long Beach, WA.  Long Beach is a long drive from here, about 350 miles, mostly on I-84 with hopping back and forth over the WA/OR border.  It was raining and dark and we couldn't see much as we crossed over the mouth of the Columbia River on the Astoria Bridge to WA.

 Thanks to the Encyclopedia Britannica - view from Astoria

The bridge itself is about 4 miles long with the peak on the south side in Oregon.  All sorts of shipping passes under this bridge to continue its travels either upstream or out to the Pacific Ocean bound for just about anywhere you can imagine.

We had a great time in a two bedroom cottage which proved to be cozy and adequate even with six children from 5 to 13 in it.  We assembled a new 1000 piece puzzle and played a new game, "Settlers of Catan" a great game, and old ones like Parcheesi.  My sister appeared from Portland for one afternoon with her two children and 8 kid sized kimonos rescued from a school theater production.  Someone had hand sewn these and someone else had tossed them in the dumpster!  The gowns were beautiful and in between rainstorms the girls played badminton, basketball, and tag arrayed in their kimonos looking like lovely winter butterflies.

Now we are home, Christmas is done, but not packed quite away.  I've caught a cold and am sore, coughing, sweating, and cannot breed thru my node either.  My car has to be taken to a dealer in another city to be repaired.  It's covered by the warranty but it never occurred to me when I bought it that the lack of a dealer in our little burg would be a problem.  Oh well.  Later!  For now more tea and a nap.  I will lie down and visualize the big waves rolling in at Long Beach, and the piles of delicious cod fish and chips we had.