Warrenton, Oregon

Day 40, Our last stop for the Lewis and Clark tour. How sad we began to feel as our trip was near ending. We began the last leg of our trip with a chili dinner that we prepared for the guests. At our orientation meeting, one of our guests, who had been on many Adventure Caravan trips, mentioned that he had everything “AC” accept a pair of underwear. We also used this opportunity to present him with his own“Adventure Caravan Boxers.”

Day 41, We visited Fort Clatsop, where we saw a short film and toured a recreation of the original Fort. Actually, it’s the third fort. The first one was the original, the second one was a recreation, which burned down, so this is the third one. Fort Clatsop is where the Lewis & Clark Expedition spent 4 “rainy” months preparing for their return home. Three sergeants and 24 men squeezed into three small enlisted men’s quarters. Lewis & Clark shared a room, Charbonneau, the interpreter, and his Shoshone wife, Sacagawea, and their baby shared a room. York, may have lived near Lewis & Clark.

Salt Works was an area close to the Pacific Ocean where pots were set up to boil the ocean water to extract the salt. Back then, salt was a highly sought commodity.


Then we FINALLY got to see the Pacific Ocean! What a sight that was! We were so glad to finally reach our destination, just as I’m sure Lewis and Clark and his men felt when they reached this area on November 18, 1805.

We stopped at the Astoria Column, which we could not go up because they had not finished rebuilding the stairs, and the Peter Iredale Ship Wreck, which is the most photographed shipwreck.

The Maritime Museum is located in the quaint town of Astoria. We had a guided tour which was very informative on the ships of the area. This area was one of the largest salmon packing industry. One section was devoted to this industry. Do you recognize any of the labels below?

In the Maritime Museum, we found a plague of the shipbuilder of some of the older ships from England. It was Wm. Hamilton & Co., Ship Builders, Port Glasgow. Since Bill’s family is from that area, we think we might be related. We’ll have to check on that.

We found a nice restaurant near the Maritime Museum for a lunch and returned to the campground in time to prepare for our farewell dinner. We provided beautiful steaks and let our guests grill them to their perfection. We also had baked potato and lots of fixins, salad, rolls, many of our guests brought munchies, apple pie, ice cream, beverages and wine. What a feast! After dinner, everyone reported their most memorable and humorous memories of the trip. What a wonderful walk down memory lane!

Day 42 was a free day!!! Bobby, Marcia, Bill and I set out early for a great motorcycle ride to visit some places we would like to add to future tours. We started out at Cape Disappointment and Waikiki Beach.

We found that Cape Disappointment was named because of Capt. Gray from England. He came to the area seeking the same things as Lewis and Clark, a river passage across the United States. But by the time he arrived in this area, his men were so sick with scurvy that he could not send them out in smaller boats to search for the passage. He had to leave the area without exploring. We also found that this is the most hazardous river entrances in the world because of the Columbia River Bar. “The Bar” is a shifting sandbar where strong currents and wind-born waves meet shallow water. “Shifting sand sinks ships”

Day 43 was the last day of the tour where we gave our hugs and said our goodbyes at our hitch-up breakfast. It was so difficult to say goodbye to people we had such a wonderful time with for the past 42 days, but we can now say we have some new-found friends.

If you ever get the opportunity to travel with Adventure Caravans, the Lewis and Clark tour runs every 2 years and is well worth it. We have made some changes to the schedule and feel the trip in 2011 will be exceptional.