Day 1446 – 40+

Hours of Daylight – 10:41
No doubt about the worst of winter is now over. By that i mean the coldest days are probably behind us, but we’ll still have a good amount of snowy days. Not to temp fate and speak of the current winter in the past tense, but it has been number two in terms of cold and harsh winds.

But who cares about that?

The news: i’m now offically 40+ years old. Both my parent died not too far into their 80’s, so i find it impossible not to feel that i’m at my half-way point.

To celebrate the auspicious occasion i did what i always do when there is an important anniversary to be noted: i went someplace away from Minneapolis. For this event Annette and i returned to the place where we spent New Year’s 1999-2000: Astoria, Oregon. Actually we did two nights in Astoria then two nights in Portland. Normally we would have stayed at the same place where we spent New Years: Fort Stevens State Park. They have yurts there… and if you’ve not yet slept in a yurt during one of the endless gentle rainshowers of the Oregon coast you have missed out on a great experience.

As we began planning this trip i learned that Fort Stevens was largely closed for renovation. All their yurts were unavailable. So we went to the opposite extreme and stayed at fancy hotels.

Here are some photos:

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Mount Hood while on initial approach.

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View from our room in Astoria

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North jetty, Columbia River and Pacific

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Crossing from WA toward Astoria, OR.

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Astoria from the Column

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Ship at anchor

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The Astoria Column

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Porland from the Hotel Lucia

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Shelter in the Japanese Garden

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Gardener’s house at the Japanese Garden

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