Travel Tuesday

"Lighthouses are not just stone, brick, metal, and glass. There's a human story at every lighthouse; that's the story I want to tell." -Elinor Dewire

I have decided that this blog is getting rather blah. Partly because I'm ignoring it. So perhaps I'll mix things up a bit to keep from abandoning this project completely. I think I'll devote Tuesdays to recounting some of my most favorite travel memories. I almost feel silly doing so considering how little traveling I've actually done. But I do love travel. Much of my thoughts center around where I've been and where I want to go next. I will share, each Tuesday, some of my most delightful travel memories. I'll try to stay away from some of the more obvious places. You know, Disneyland or the Eiffel Tower, because everyone loves those places. I'll try to stick with those places that may be a little less known or when discussing the well-known places at least try to relate an experience that made that place unusual. Maybe I'll share a travel tip or two as well. 

First on the list: 
Heceta Head Lighthouse Keeper's House, Florence Oregon

To give you the story behind this little place, I will read from my journal entry written on the first of August 2012 while sitting on the porch of this quaint home.

"Ten years ago, we brought our three little toddlers to the Oregon Coast for the first time. We thought it might be fun to take an afternoon and travel up the coast and see some lighthouses...So we took our two year old, three year old, and six year old and stopped at this beautiful lighthouse perched a top a cliff. The lighthouse was great, but I was more intrigued by the quaint house that sat down the hill from the lighthouse. There were people sitting on the large porch of the house over-looking the vast ocean. I found myself envying those people and wondering what I might have to do to win myself a seat on that charming porch..."

"Those children are now quite grown and one more has been added to the bunch. After 18 years of marriage, we have finally pulled that little dream of staying in the Lighthouse Keeper's Quarters out of the back closets of our minds, dusted it off, and brought it to fruition...Here I sit, perched on that beautiful porch, in this perfect adirondack chair, beholding the splendor of the vast ocean in front of me. How very lucky I am! And I am referring less to the house and the view, and more to the man sitting next to me. He makes so many of my dreams a reality."

Of all the bed and breakfasts that Neil and I have stayed at, this was by far my favorite. It was not cheap but so so worth the money. We arrived at the home fairly late and just let ourselves in. A little family was seated in this parlor, enjoying a fire and wine that they had just purchased in Willamette Valley. We looked for the resident kitties but they seemed to be hiding that evening.

Neil and I made our way up the narrow staircase, stopping to look at the view from the beautiful stained glass window.

Our room was just lovely. We were so glad that we had paid a little extra for a room with a view.

We felt a little like we had stepped back in time. It had that old house smell. We threw open the windows and inhaled that cool, salty ocean air, and resolved that we would sleep with the windows open.

I have never seen screens on any windows along the Oregon Coast. Just as Neil and I had deduced that there must be no bugs in the Pacific Northwest, this monstrosity came flying into our sanctum sanctorum. The audacity! Apparently there are bugs in Oregon, and they are of the large variety. Neil finally swatted that sucker senseless but not before giving in to a sudden bout of the heebeegeebees. 

We did not back away from our resolve to sleep with the windows open. But we did turn out the lights and pulled the sheer curtains over the windows. We were unmolested by any more hideous specimen that evening. We drifted off to sleep. The full moon was glowing through the window. The rhythmic sound of the ocean acted as a lullaby. I found myself waking up in the night and listening for the ocean. As soon as I could hear its rushing sound, I would relax and go back to sleep.

We woke up bright and early. The sun and the sea beckoned us to come out and enjoy them. And so we did.

We ventured out onto that gorgeous porch. I felt a little Anne Lindberg-esque with such a view before me. The ocean makes me want to do one of two things...to read or to write. This morning, writing won out, and I'm so glad. I'm so glad that I wrote down the thoughts dancing through my mind that cool peaceful morning.

And all of this wasn't even the best part. The best part was the breakfast. The seven course breakfast. My salivary glands get all excited just thinking about it. 

All of the guests were called into breakfast at around 9:00. We got to know one another as the hostess began to bring out each course. There was the couple that we had met in the parlor the night before. They were from Florida and had come with their eleven year old daughter who had done a state report on Oregon. They had already taken kayaks down the Rogue River and were planning on taking ATV's to the dunes that afternoon. There was also the newlywed couple from Portland. 

The food. Oh the food. There was a quiche and sweet bread that were to die for. And a berry smoothie made from local berries to clear the palate. The sausage was made from local grass-fed pork, and the goat cheese came from just down the lane, and the salmon was fresh from the sea. All the vegetables and herbs came from the garden just outside the window. Breakfast was a two hour experience that I just reveled in. I know that it's silly to expect to be able to have a two hour dining experience every morning. After all, we are not French aristocrats. But there was something about that unhurried morning in that old house, eating food that had been prepared with such great care, among people who were now our friends because of the experience we had shared in that house, that made me just wish that this was my normal life. Our lives are too hurried. We don't stop to revel in good food and good company often enough.

It was time to leave that picturesque house. We had spent a moment in another time, but the 21st century was calling us back. We left with great reluctance. I will leave with some final thoughts from my journal:

"I had a sense of what it must have been like to live in this house with my family one hundred years ago. Sitting around the fire in that little parlor doing my stitchery while the children quietly played. Having my husband return after checking the lighthouse. Taking our kerosene lamps with us as we headed up the narrow winding staircase to our bedrooms. It would be a simple life perched here next to the Heceta Head Lighthouse one hundred years ago. It would be a most isolating life. But today, I think it would not be a bad life at all. Just me and Neil and our beautiful children living a quiet, intimate life here in one of the most beautiful places on the Oregon Coast, in this charming house. Yes, it would be a good life! And I have to say that I am a little heartbroken at the idea of going home and not waking up to the cool ocean air streaming through my window and the sound of the waves pulling me out of my slumber."

I realize that this is not Tuesday. But it's Thursday, and that's almost the same.  I'm so excited at the notion of actually completing a post that I'm just going to hit publish with no regrets. I'm so excited to be doing something other than planning a wedding right now, that I have cause to celebrate. I wish I was going somewhere. Somewhere like Florence Oregon, or Paris, or Seattle, or anywhere. For now, I'll just remember the places I've been. For now, that will have to be enough. Until next Travel Tuesday. Adieu.