Much Needed Long Weekend
It’s amazing how wonderful a four-day weekend can be.
I’ve been in great need of a few days off, so I took advantage of the Veteran’s Day holiday today and made it into a four-day weekend.
I’ve been wanting to visit my brother Bryan and his wife Annie in Coquille, Oregon, and when my brother let me know that he had obtained another box of 80 used inflations from his friend who owns a dairy, I told him I’d drive down and pick them up rather than having him ship them.
This is an excellent reason to schedule a family visit
It’s about a four-hour drive from Portland to Coquille. The last hour of the drive is over the Coast Range of mountains and is my favorite part of the drive.
It’s much farther than the few inches on this map
So on Saturday, I packed up the dogs and headed south. I stopped at Poodletopia on the way and ran Bender on a kick ass wide open course Heidi had set up for me in her barn. It was a great way to start the weekend. That Heidi is an excellent barn sharer!
I got to my brother’s place at around 2:00, and was greeted at the front door with a nice cold IPA! It was perfect! We continued to drink beer all weekend… my brother always keeps an excellent selection of good beer on hand.
I love visiting my brother and his wife. They live out in the country where you can’t see another house.
I made a watercolor of the view out of their living room window
They have an orchard, a little woods where we took lots of walks with the dogs, some sheep, amazing gardens, a wood shop, a potting shed, and a beautiful house they built that takes advantage of the views of their little valley. They heat their house with a wood stove, so the atmosphere is perfect!
Forrest enjoys the atmosphere, and the warmth
My brother is a retired cabinet-maker who is now building amazing mandolins and ukeleles. He loves to play music and plays in several different local bands. His wife is an amazing gardener, and is learning to play the ukelele. They are old hippies -- and two of my favorite people on earth.
Forrest likes Bryan and one of the mandolins Bryan built
Forrest likes Annie too...she is a good source of heat
They bought their property almost 30 years ago and built everything you see on it - the house, shop, out buildings, gardens, orchard, all of it.
Here’s a satellite image of their eight acre property
As perfect and rejuvenating as Bryan and Annie’s place is, it’s not much of a place for terriers who are not off leash dogs. Their yard is completely fenced into sections, but the driveway gate has holes large enough to keep deer out, but it doesn’t provide much of a challenge for a 14 lb terrier! And several livestock gates don’t do much to keep a terrier away from the sheep, or from running down the road.
This meant that much of my weekend was spent making sure all the doors were closed, worrying constantly about where Forrest was, and shuffling leashed dogs in and out for peeing, pooping, and exercising. It was a stroke of brilliance for me to toss one of my xpens in the car before we left. I set it up inside the kitchen door, and It made it so easy to shuffle dogs in and out, and to give them a place for their feet to dry off before they were given freedom in the house.
I came to a very important conclusion this weekend. An orchard is a horrible place to have two terriers on flexi leashes. There were moments when I didn’t think we’d ever make it out of there!
Persimmons picked fresh from the tangled web of an orchard
One of the best things about Bryan and Annie’s place is that it’s just 30 minutes away from some beautiful Oregon beaches.
On Sunday we went into Bandon By the Sea and strolled through some of the shops, had lunch at the posh Bandon Dunes golf resort, and hit the Seven Devils beach at around 4:00, to allow for badly timed high tides. It was cloudy and misty, which meant there was no one on the beach but us. Bender ran free, and I let Skeeter run free since there weren’t any other dogs on the beach. Forrest is never allowed off leash as I know I’d never see him again.
Exhausted beach dogs
We went back to the same beach on Monday, but the weather was completely different… Sunny, blue skies, one of the prettiest days I’ve ever seen at the Oregon coast. The sky was amazing. What a fantastic day. The tides were about the same as Sunday, so we headed out at around 3:30. We walked two miles and turned around and headed back to the car. We didn't see another person on the beach the entire time. We got back to the car just in time to watch the sun dip below the horizon. Nothing like watching the sunset over the Pacific.
Bender contemplates a swim to Hawaii
Forrest thinks barnacles are delicious!
Future holiday card
Amazing sky!
Whispy rock dog
Fresh water refreshment
Amazing light on the way back to the car
Bryan and Annie
We watched the sun set
Until the last green flash faded
We ended the day with home made chicken noodle soup and even more exhausted dogs.
Before I left Coquille today, we took the dogs for one last walk around the woods. They slept silently the entire ride home.
I’ve been in great need of a few days off, so I took advantage of the Veteran’s Day holiday today and made it into a four-day weekend.
I’ve been wanting to visit my brother Bryan and his wife Annie in Coquille, Oregon, and when my brother let me know that he had obtained another box of 80 used inflations from his friend who owns a dairy, I told him I’d drive down and pick them up rather than having him ship them.
This is an excellent reason to schedule a family visit
It’s about a four-hour drive from Portland to Coquille. The last hour of the drive is over the Coast Range of mountains and is my favorite part of the drive.
It’s much farther than the few inches on this map
So on Saturday, I packed up the dogs and headed south. I stopped at Poodletopia on the way and ran Bender on a kick ass wide open course Heidi had set up for me in her barn. It was a great way to start the weekend. That Heidi is an excellent barn sharer!
I got to my brother’s place at around 2:00, and was greeted at the front door with a nice cold IPA! It was perfect! We continued to drink beer all weekend… my brother always keeps an excellent selection of good beer on hand.
I love visiting my brother and his wife. They live out in the country where you can’t see another house.
I made a watercolor of the view out of their living room window
They have an orchard, a little woods where we took lots of walks with the dogs, some sheep, amazing gardens, a wood shop, a potting shed, and a beautiful house they built that takes advantage of the views of their little valley. They heat their house with a wood stove, so the atmosphere is perfect!
Forrest enjoys the atmosphere, and the warmth
My brother is a retired cabinet-maker who is now building amazing mandolins and ukeleles. He loves to play music and plays in several different local bands. His wife is an amazing gardener, and is learning to play the ukelele. They are old hippies -- and two of my favorite people on earth.
Forrest likes Bryan and one of the mandolins Bryan built
Forrest likes Annie too...she is a good source of heat
They bought their property almost 30 years ago and built everything you see on it - the house, shop, out buildings, gardens, orchard, all of it.
Here’s a satellite image of their eight acre property
As perfect and rejuvenating as Bryan and Annie’s place is, it’s not much of a place for terriers who are not off leash dogs. Their yard is completely fenced into sections, but the driveway gate has holes large enough to keep deer out, but it doesn’t provide much of a challenge for a 14 lb terrier! And several livestock gates don’t do much to keep a terrier away from the sheep, or from running down the road.
This meant that much of my weekend was spent making sure all the doors were closed, worrying constantly about where Forrest was, and shuffling leashed dogs in and out for peeing, pooping, and exercising. It was a stroke of brilliance for me to toss one of my xpens in the car before we left. I set it up inside the kitchen door, and It made it so easy to shuffle dogs in and out, and to give them a place for their feet to dry off before they were given freedom in the house.
I came to a very important conclusion this weekend. An orchard is a horrible place to have two terriers on flexi leashes. There were moments when I didn’t think we’d ever make it out of there!
Persimmons picked fresh from the tangled web of an orchard
One of the best things about Bryan and Annie’s place is that it’s just 30 minutes away from some beautiful Oregon beaches.
On Sunday we went into Bandon By the Sea and strolled through some of the shops, had lunch at the posh Bandon Dunes golf resort, and hit the Seven Devils beach at around 4:00, to allow for badly timed high tides. It was cloudy and misty, which meant there was no one on the beach but us. Bender ran free, and I let Skeeter run free since there weren’t any other dogs on the beach. Forrest is never allowed off leash as I know I’d never see him again.
Exhausted beach dogs
We went back to the same beach on Monday, but the weather was completely different… Sunny, blue skies, one of the prettiest days I’ve ever seen at the Oregon coast. The sky was amazing. What a fantastic day. The tides were about the same as Sunday, so we headed out at around 3:30. We walked two miles and turned around and headed back to the car. We didn't see another person on the beach the entire time. We got back to the car just in time to watch the sun dip below the horizon. Nothing like watching the sunset over the Pacific.
Bender contemplates a swim to Hawaii
Forrest thinks barnacles are delicious!
Future holiday card
Amazing sky!
Whispy rock dog
Fresh water refreshment
Amazing light on the way back to the car
Bryan and Annie
We watched the sun set
Until the last green flash faded
We ended the day with home made chicken noodle soup and even more exhausted dogs.
Before I left Coquille today, we took the dogs for one last walk around the woods. They slept silently the entire ride home.