About to cross the Columbia River from Washington into Oregon at the Biggs Junction

Normally Mt Hood stands out clear and crisp in the distance but the many fires in the west have diminished the view.

Eastern Oregon has millions of acres of dryland wheat that is stored in the grain silos until a barge carries it to the pacific

On my trips I'm limited to how many people I can visit so I get out my family directory. I had to scroll through three pages before I found one that would tolerate a visit from me. Many thanks to my cousin Don and his wife Dawn! Sitting on his deck overlooking Puget Sound we were treated to a visit by Agness who stopped by to eat her lunch. It was just a small maybe 14" fish as measured by my keen eyesight.

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Her friend moved in hoping to share a bite or two with her.

All the way across the sound you can see some remaining snow in the peaks of the Olympic peninsula

Don

Don inherited Skippy after our Uncle Norm passed.

This is Don's little 63' boat Jubilee. I have no idea what she cost, but the little tender was $35k

If you want to go for a ride, you have to wake her up first. That takes a couple of hours.

First thing is to remove her sunglasses.

After that it's time to have lunch

Skippy and Aussie wondering why they aren't on the same lunch schedule as we are.

We are only sitting in 12.5' of water and she drafts 5'

Incredible luxury!  Two bathrooms (heads for you boat people), sleeps six, flying bridge.

Below deck

In the engine room are two 800HP Cat engines.

They can push her along at 33knots but I could only afford that for 15secs. At twelve knots, she only cost about $5 per mile.

In his hand is a remote controller. He can control forward and reverse, both side thrusters, even while standing on the dock.

Finally under way, just need to dodge a bunch of poorly identified crab pots while leaving the harbor.

Of course what would my blog be if I didn't mention Sherm.

Running along at 23 knots or is that naughts

That's a lot of water being move by those two screws

We aren't truly in the open seas, but all we have to dodge now are sunken logs, major seaweed beds, orcas, dolphins, sailboats and other small craft, and oh yeah, those islands.

The little tender has a forty hp Yamaha

One of my other cousins lives on the north end of that island

Even the puppies have to wear their life vest.

Takes a while to understand the charts and gauges, but they do make sense after awhile.

Now how do I get to that Slalom course

I think I see it.

Back at the dock, Jubilee has been put back to sleep. Her neighbor here is for sale for a measly 1.7 million.

This guy is currently considering my $1,700 offer

After leaving my cousins I went to visit a great friend and his kids on the Olympic Peninsula. I stopped here and had a very average and very expensive breakfast on my way there.

The tide is out and I learned two things while I stopped to check it out. One, I can't throw a rock even 1/10th of the distance I used to be able to throw one. Two, you are going to sink in that muck if you try to walk out in it. Learned that from the rock.

I fueled up at a tribal gas station and these pirates were checking out their boat.

They are headed to a parade in McCleary

My friend Steve is now riding a Can Am

He has this nice RV set up next to his kids house.

They built this great deck to enjoy the pleasant days.

This was the first time that I have ever ridden a Can Am. It was a Slittle thing.

Steve has quite a few miles on it so he looks a lot more comfortable than I did. I hated to have to cut my visit so short, but I had a three hour ride back to Portland at 95 degrees and I'm getting gun shy after my experience with heat exhaustion a couple of weeks ago.