July 7 - North Cascades National Park

Tonight we’ll spend the night at another Harvest Host, Ovenell’s Heritage Inn in Concrete. 

Scenic Route 20 will get us there over Loup Loup Pass, steep climb up the mountain and then down into the valley. 

Beautiful drive BUT, very mountainous with lots of twists and turns. 

The mileage was only about 100 miles to where we are staying but it took us almost 4 hours. Ida doesn’t go fast on those kinds of roads!

Our Harvest Host site is on a 500 acre family farm. We have a huge space all to ourselves with access to the Skagit River and a woods trail. 

This is our view of Mt Ranier tonight. Wow. Look at all that snow. 


Linda and I drove into the little town of Concrete. Yep, you guessed it, several buildings are made of concrete and at one time was a concrete production. They have a bridge made entirely of concrete spanning the Skagit river. 

Interesting town but not much here. 

After dinner, Linda and I sat by the river for awhile reading. Another guest took our picture. 

Tomorrow we will drive to Sedro-Woolley near the Pugot  Sound. 

East of Portland-Multnomah Falls and Mount Hood

Saturday, September 10

Up early to drive to our next Harvest Host location, Stone Circle Cidery. 

As we pulled into the Cidery, it didn’t look open but we thought we were early. Then the owner came over to talk to us. Unfortunately, there was a fire about 4 miles away from where we were so we decided to leave. Since it was a Saturday night, all the campground were full so back to Tillamook we went. We were able to stay in the same Harvest Host, Blue Heron French Cheese. Dinner was a salmon packet and Tillamook ice cream, because we were stressed 😜. 

Sunday, September 11

Sunday morning Bill found a 2.5 trail hike at the Kilchis Point Reserve. A nice little hike to Tillamook Bay. 

Kilchis Point was the site of one of the largest permanent Native American villages on the Northern Oregon Coast. Tillamook County’s first pioneer settler, Joe Champion arrived at Kilchis Point in 1851 and was invited by Chief Kilchis to live in a spruce stump next to the Native American village while he built a cabin. 

A very nice interpretive trail to learn about some of the history of Tillamook.