Wide Angle Wednesday

We had to drive over to the beach house to take care of some things; we drove home along the coastline on Hwy 101. This photo was taken from a viewpoint pullover looking back at Manzanita and beyond. We saw the whales spouting in the distance and the skies were blue and clear.

Oregon prides itself having all open beaches; no one owns the beaches and no one can block the beach in front of their property. So it is very strange to see all the beaches closed to the public....yes, closed. All beach accesses are blocked; people are not supposed to go down on the beach!!!  It is Spring Break week so many families planned to go camping, fishing, crabbing and enjoying the beach; the road to the beach on Friday was bumper to bumper cars, campers, trailer houses, etc. All the campgrounds were told to close so those who didn't have a place to stay headed back home. When the beaches closed more went back home....so when we got to the beach house the town was very quiet. Nothing was open except for one small grocery store and one take out Fish & Chips......the roads were quiet. Even the boat ramps are blocked with big cement barriers.....so no fishing or crabbing except for the commercial boats who have moorage.

In fact, driving home on Hwy 26 felt eerie; there were periods of 15-20 minutes where we saw NO CARs.....none......that hwy is usually very very busy. As we got closer to Portland the traffic increased but still less than usual.

Now we are home just West of Portland, in Washington County. The newspaper headline today says that Oregon is baffled that 1/3 of all of the coronavirus  cases are here; 2 of the 8 deaths in Oregon are in our county. Yikes. I kind of want to go back to the beach, but I think we are supposed to stay here. 

The Extra photo is of my Star Magnolia tree. There are a massive number of flowers.....so beautiful.