The Oregon Coast is a funny thing to me.
The beaches I grew up traveling to were calm, boring sandy strips of Southern California Coast. Not that there's anything wrong with a large area of sand that is predictably sunny and a nice place to take children on a summer's day. Nope, nothing wrong with it at all.
But the Oregon coast is wild; unpredictable, really. One moment you are standing on the sunny shore with what seems like miles of sand in front of you-and the next, you are ankle deep in ocean water and dark clouds are rolling in. I love it.
Recently we had the good fortune of being able to borrow a car (we sold our's when James went back to school) and had a few days off-so we headed out to Manzanita Beach. While there we saw a hand written sign for a rummage sale in the nearby town of Wheeler.
We jumped at the idea of a rummage sale held in a town that boasts 391 residents. And while the rummage sale was a bit frightening, we found the town of Wheeler quite charming.
We had breakfast in a funny little cafe downstairs from the old Wheeler Hotel. We ate our bacon and eggs at a table near the window-where several of the town's old folk were gathered with binoculars. A heard of Elk were stuck on an embankment on the other side of the nearby river. They were watching the Elk's every move and even offered us a look.
We wandered down the small main street and found junk shop after junk shop full of treasures. Sea glass and old Japanese floats abounded as well as driftwood and paintings of boats. It wasn't clear if these vendors actually wanted to sell these items or if they thought of their spaces as small museums to a fading way of life.
One thing was certain; I was happy to have stumbled upon that little town.
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I hope your Tuesday is going well. See you back here tomorrow.
