Oregon Road Trip 2012
November 2012 brought us back to Oregon for our annual visit during Thanksgiving week. The trip was in many ways like previous years: visiting family, long drives on I-5, and plenty of genuine Oregon rain. We made stops at are usual places, including the Cornerstone Bakery & Cafe in Dunsmuir; Mad River Brewing, the Redwood Motel and The Train Depot in Grants Pass; Rogue headquarters in Newport; the Pelican Pub; and of course Aunt Lisa’s cabin for Thanksgiving dinner.
This year I made note of several potential offroad and backroad drives as well as some other potential sights – if time permitted. We ended up doing several of these and really just had one long drive/exploration in Oregon that we didn’t get to, mainly due to the weather and being lazy! I always have more things listed on the “to do” list than we have time for.
On the drive up we had a couple of possible side trips in California as well, but again the weather wasn’t cooperating, and the family wasn’t going to tolerate a lot of walking around in the cold rain. I opted to save those for another day. Instead, I took a target of opportunity and drove the dirt Klamathon Road, something I wanted to do for several years now. Check that box as done!
As we passed the border into Oregon the weather changed from rainy & overcast to proper Oregon heavy rain and fog. It would stay that way for much of our trip, as our first 24hrs in Lincoln City coincided with the first big storm of the season. Winds gusted to 60mph down at sea level where we were staying, and up to 100mph on Mt. Hebo which we visited a couple of days later. Thanksgiving, appropriately enough, turned out to be our only non-rain day in Oregon this year.
On the drive from Grants Pass to Lincoln City, we drove the “Coos Bay Wagon Road”, which is Drive #15 in the excellent Oregon Byways book. On our return drive home, we also managed to fit in Drive #14 from that book, “North Siuslaw River”, although we drove it in the reverse direction. I’ll be detailing these drives, along with Klamathon Road, in greater detail in separate posts.
All in all it was a great trip, and it went by far too fast! Hopefully it won’t be another year before we visit again.
Oregon 2012 Trip Statistics:
- 1,732 miles
- 31 miles on dirt
- 9 days
- 3 brewpubs
- 1 major winter storm
- 1 tree winching
- 4 dirt/backroad drives