Leaving SLC Friday for PDX and the Oregon Coast

[Love My Westy]

I'll be leaving Salt Lake Friday, headed for a wedding on the 25th in Portland.
I plan a two day drive to visit Baja friends in Sisters and Albany, probably arriving in Portland around Tuesday the 20th.

I'm looking forward to seeing Carterzest's new Syncro and meeting any interested Samba Members if we can work it out.

It looks like I will be occupied with family and wedding from Friday the 23rd through Sunday or Monday, and after that I will be driving down the Oregon Coast before returning to SLC via possibly via Crater Lake.

I need to be back in time to take my wife to the desert in So Utah on the 7th of October.

[BillWYellowstone]

Have a safe trip! I am in Ogden on occasion, maybe some time we could grab a coffee.
_________________
Live Fulltime in motorhome
Have 86 Westy Camper 2.1 rebuilt
Work in Yellowstone NP year round.

[buspor63]

Probably a silly question, but what does "PDX" stand for/
_________________
Imagine that, theres not an "h" in either Westfalia or Syncro?

[syncrodoka]

People often refer to Portland, OR by it's airport code PDX

[carterzest]

[Love My Westy]

[carterzest]

[Love My Westy]

I made it to Albany yesterday and will be staying with friends until tomorrow. The van has run great so far. I drove up I-84 to Ontario, Or and then took hwy 20 west through Burns, camping out on a dirt road on BLM land about 40 miles east of Burns. Then I headed toward Bend and Sisters to stay with friends I spend the winters with in Baja.

I did not see one Vanagon until just outside of Bend. Now I have probably seen as many as 10 of them on the road. Yesterday I drove down to Albany to stay a couple of nights with other Baja friends of mine.

I just wish I had a new stereo to play my satellite radio through, but alas being its and '86 I need to not only replace the head unit but rewire for 2 groundwires and new speakers, a project that I will try to get done this fall. I still have an old Alpine cassette player that has one of those tape things that plugs into the satellite receiver. The real pain is that the tape player keeps switching directions every minute or so and I lose the sound.

Tomorrow I'm headed over to visit carterzest and see his new Syncro. I'll be in the PDX area until next Monday or Tuesday.

[Jake de Villiers]

[carterzest]

Great to see you again Rich!
Small world here in the PNW, Josh's Dad Ken, lives 2 blocks from where you are staying in West Linn OR. Very cool to have you here in PDX for a week
Have a safe trip down the coast and back over to UT. You guys need to meet Rich. He is the only ONE OWNER Westfalia driver I have ever encountered The guy knows his sh!t!
Great meet with Ken and Josh and Rich at Meldrum Bar park on the Willamette River in Milwaukie Oregon. We arrived to an "I wish I had a Syncro" story But, thankfully, no recovery attempts were necessary. Good times boys!

_________________
Happiness=Portland, Oregon in the rearview mirror!

[Love My Westy]

I've had a great time here in Portland thanks to carterzest's hospitality. The Westravaganza last night was a hoot, down by the river meeting Josh and Ken and seeing their vans. I also got to ride in Jeff's '57 Single Cab.

Great people on the Samba!

[carterzest]

[populuxe59]

Thanks for answering the PDX question, I checked this topic just hoping to find out.

The only thing I can add is that GTA is greater Toronto area.

Chris C in NEW (North East Wisconsin)

[Love My Westy]

I made it to the wedding on Sunday evening after a weekend of transporting guests around and picking up my wife at the airport.

The bad news came as we were just getting off the freeway and pulling into the wedding venue when a noise that I had actually been hearing since I was halfway across Oregon, but was in denial that there was anything wrong, suddenly got louder. It got loud enough that I all of a sudden knew what it was...a bad CV joint. I had heard a knocking sound but thought it might have been bad fuel or something. It seemed to come and go while driving at speed so I couldn't pin it down until it got louder at slow speed.

I called Carterzest who gave me the number and address for Halsey Automotive Repair in Portland. It was Sunday night and I had a van full of people to get home so I had to decide what do.

While people were dancing and partying, I took the van for a drive to get a feel as to whether I could drive them home or whether I should try to make it over to the shop from there. I decided it would be ok to drive it to get everyone home and we made it ok with my bother-in-law following us.
Then this morning he followed me as I drove the van up to Halsey Automotive, dropped it off, and gave me a ride back to his place.

Debbie at Halsey was waiting for us as Jeffrey had already been in there this morning and told them about me. What a pleasant experience dealing with her. They called me back today about 4pm to let me know that in fact is was a bad CV joint and that they could fix it it by tomorrow afternoon and that it needed all new CV joint boots and repacking. They also tightened the new belts I installed before the trip because they had been squeeling on startup. They advised me that my brakes will need to be redone in the near future so that will be on my list when I get home.

Thanks to Carterzest, what could have been the painful job of finding a repair while on the road has turned into a positive experience.

[carterzest]

[Love My Westy]

Picked up my Van today from Halsey. They had called me and told me that I needed to redo all 4 CV joints which is what I had really expected. It was on my list of things I planned to redo and it took one of them going bad to finally force me to have them fixed. Anyway, it runs great and there are some sounds that I have been hearing that are no longer there. They must have been CV related.

My fanbelts no longer squeel, and they (Halsey) must have adjusted or lubed my shift linkage because after I picked it up it shifts much better than before. I had not asked them to do that but Carterzest told me they do that as a courtesy for their customers.

I thought their price was fair and they were nice enough to get my van to me by 1pm today, even though their shop was full and they were very busy. On top of that, they gave me one of their new T-shirts. I would recommend them to anyone.

I will be leaving Portland tomorrow to drive out 26 to Cannon Beach and from there down the coast. The weather looks like it will be nice until late next weekend.

Thanks again to carterzest for all the hospitality.

[carterzest]

[Love My Westy]

Unfortunately I came down with a very bad cold the morning I left my in-laws house and headed out to the coast and have had it ever since.

I first drove out highway 26 to Ecola State Park just north of Cannon Beach and headed south from there, camping the first night at Nehelem Bay SP.
The next morning I had a very enjoyable drive around Nehelem Bay, stopped at the bakery in Garibaldi and to the cheese factory in Tillamook.

Because of my cold, I skipped the bike ride I was going to do on the Three Capes Scenic Drive and drove it instead, choosing to just spend the rest of the day driving, finally camping at South Beach SP just south of Newport.

The next day I made it to Jessie M. Honeyman SP south of Florence. I had the campground almost to myself as the Hosts had closed the loop right after I arrived. It was interesting to find out that the next loop up was full of ATV enthusiasts who had come there for the opening of the dunes on Oct. 1st. It was a whole different scene than the loop I was in.

The next day it started to rain so I just kept driving south and camped at a Cape Blanco SP just north of Port Orford. It had a beautiful beach and lighthouse. It rained all night long and while I packed up in the morning.

At Gold Beach I turned up the Rogue River and drove a very exciting road called the Bear Coast Road. It was a small paved road that goes east to Grants Pass. It was not in very good repair, lots of rocks on the road and areas of missing pavement under repair. Then, after I was 29 miles along it I came to a road closed sign, turned around and followed a one lane dirt road detour up over the mountains, reaching an elevation of 4800 feet before it finally connected back up with the paved road which eventually made it back down to the Rogue river and where I found a place to camp
along the river. It was a real adventure. Again it rained all night and rained most of the next day.

I was going to drive up and see Crater Lake from Grants Pass but decided it was too rainy so I just kept driving east on US 140 to Klamath Falls, and Lakeview. I had dinner in Lakeview and headed east looking for a place to camp where I found a logging road and drove up it and found a flat spot just as it was getting dark. Again it rained all night.

I spent the last night at the Sheldon Wildlife Refuge on US 140 just across the border into Nevada. It's a great free campsite with a warmspring and showers. I think it is actually run by the BLM. I arrived there around noon and just spent time relaxing. Again it rained all night and all the way home the next day with a little snow on I-80 betweeb Elko and Wells, Nev.

I did not have any more problems with the Vanagon after the repairs in Portland. Total millage was 2,440 miles. It got between 17 and 18 mpg for the trip with the worst tank 16.8 and the best 18.3.
It's back in the garage now, hopefully it will be warm enough this weekend to dry everything out and get it cleaned up, and I'll get over this miserable cold.

I'll try to get some pics posted when I get settled in and feel better.

[carterzest]

[Love My Westy]

I finally got around to posting the pics that prove this trip happened:

After packing up the morning after stealth camping on BLM land just east of Burns, OR on my first night out:

At carterzest's home. We had a great time, including his getting together a PDX Westravaganza in my honor:

He even let me ride in his '57 Single Cab:

The Oregon Coast. Unfortunately I came down with a horrible cold the morning I left Portland. This was my first stop at Ecola State Park:

I was going to camp at Cape Lookout State park and ride the Three Cape Scenic route on my bicycle but I was not feeling up to it, so I tried to drive it. Unfortunately the road was out so I couldn't do the whole loop. Here is
Cape Meares (or at least the sign):

I just continued to drive that day and camped at South Beach State Park just south of Newport. I ate clam chowder at MO's in Newport and the waitress felt sorry for me because I was so miserable with the cold I could hardly talk. She brought me some camomille tea and honey, that was really nice of her:

The next day I drove south to Jesse M. Honneyman SP. It rained all night and most of the rest of the trip. From there I drove to Port Orford where I tried to look up one of by Baja friends without luck. I decided to spend the night at Cape Blanco SP:

Again it rained all night. This is what I woke up to...moss growing on my mirror:

South to Gold Beach. This is the Rogue River (where it flows into the sea) as I was crossing the bridge (note all of the fishing boats):

This is where I left the Oregon Coast and headed inland, taking the small road that winds up the Rogue River and over the mountain to Grants Pass.
After driving up the paved road which had a lot of rocks that had fallen on it, after 29 miles I came to a Road Closed sign. I turned back, went about 1/4 mile and found another sign that said Detour to Grants Pass. I took it and drove at least 10 miles on a 1 lane gravel road that wound all around and over some very high places, at one time my GPS read 4800 ft. Then the dirt road finally came back to the paved road and on toward Grants Pass. The paved road is called the Bear Coast Road. I camped along the Rogue River after the road came back down. Again it rained all night.

The next day it rained all day as I drove through Grants Pass, and picked up Highway 140 out of Medford. From there I drove east to Lakeview for dinner and then stealth camped up a Forest Service road somewhere between Lakeview and Adel. The next morning I drove east and camped at the Sheldon Wildlife Refuge where there is free camping and a warm spring. It is just across the Oregon border into Nevada. I arrived there about 11 AM and had a nice relaxing day just hanging out there. It didn't rain until that night.

The next mornings drive from Sheldon Wildlife Refuge south to Winnemucca, Nev. (note the snow on the peaks):

I tried to catch my speedo turning 140,000 miles but couldn't get it fast enough: