Tuesday: The weather was significantly better today. Not tons of sunshine, but the sun did shine occasionally and the rain was limited to a few sprinkles – so it was great! Randy has been driving a lot of miles on difficult roads in bad weather, so it’s time to relax a bit. We headed out to see what the town of Tillamook has to offer.
First stop – the Tillamook Cheese Factory. This is a pretty facility with a large visitor section. They don’t allow visitors in the whole factory, but there is a viewing area over the packing line. In the store they offer samples of several of their cheeses, and Randy bought a few for us. We also had lunch there - grilled cheese and fries, chased by an ice cream for me and a shake for Randy. They make good dairy products and we would buy their label again.
We also visited the Blue Heron Cheese Factory, but it is less factory and more gift shop. They did have some nice samples of Brie cheese.
A bit south on 101 is the turnoff to Munson Creek Falls. It’s supposed to be the tallest falls in Northern Oregon, about 266 feet tall. It was a couple mile drive down a side road followed by a bit of a walk, but it was, indeed, a beautiful falls, slipping off the edge of a cliff far above our heads.
The Air Museum was our last stop of the day. It’s a huge, huge hanger that originally was used to house up to 8 blimps for the US Navy. In 1942 the Navy started constructing a total of 17 wooden hangars, due to the scarcity of metal during the war, all US coastlines to house the K-class blimps that were used to protect ships against submarines. Two of these hangars were built in Tillamook. Hangar “B” was the first to be built it was 1,072’ in length, 192’ high and had a width of 236’. That gave it over 7 acres of covered floor space. The doors, at each end are 120’ high, 6 sections with each section weighing 30 tons for a total of 180 tons with an opening of 220’. The second hangar “A” was built in a total of 27 days, unfortunately it was destroyed by fire in 1992. Hangar “B” is now home to several old but restored planes, from WW2, the Vietnam war, etc. The collection is extensive and well worth seeing. They say they have the only flying J2F-6 Duck in the world. The remaining empty space is rented out as RV and Boat storage to help offset the costs.
At the end of the day we dined on leftovers – but those leftovers were home-made lasagna and carrot cake – the perfect end to a relaxing day.
Good job reporting on the air museum. Hope you get a chance to visit the Evergreen Air Museum at McMinnville, home of the Spruce Goose. Many good winerys are located within 10 miles of the Museum.
ReplyDeleteWe are just north of San Antonio for the next month, went to the Alamo & the river walk today. Tomorrow is wine tasting in the hill country, I have been posting pictures on facebook.