Friday
We left home a little before lunch, stopping at our favorite neighborhood café on the way out of town for some iced drinks. It was an impossibly warm day – the radio said it was supposed to get to 75. Incredible. We weren’t as optimistic about the weather at the beach (it always seems the beach is the opposite of whatever it is inland), but either way was fine.
The drive was easy, and we got to the Stephanie Inn much earlier than we thought we’d be able to check in. We pulled in and Chris went in to ask if they could hold our bags for us until check-in time, and they said our room was ready already – so we checked in, got our bags into the room, and quickly changed into short-sleeves for a walk on the beach that was right outside our room!
Stephanie Inn postcards, & a picture of our room
(Speaking of the room, it’s wonderful in that same way the Fairmont was in Seattle – understated, not ginormous, just reasonable with nice touches. The jacuzzi tub is huge, takes up half of the bathroom (it’s about three times as big as the shower stall – I guess they expect more people will bathe than shower). The king bed seems huge compared to our queen. We’re on the first floor, and the patio overlooks the ocean and Haystack Rock is slightly to the right. Some of the nice little touches – there’s a teddy bear on the bed, a card was waiting for us wishing us a happy anniversary, there’s a rubber duckie on the edge of the tub, the robes are silk… Yum.)
So, we changed into short-sleeves and took advantage of the crazily warm weather with a walk on the beach. I brought my camera, and Chris learned how to be a photographer’s assistant – he diligently wrote down every shutter speed and F-stop entry as I called them out after each shot. What a help! I eventually taught him how to take a meter reading, and how to adjust either the shutter speed or aperture in order to get the meter where it wanted to be, so he now gets why I’m taking so long… But he was patient with me as the assistant, as well – I can’t (and won’t) complain.
We walked south on the beach to Mo’s, where we had a little snack – knowing we had dinner reservations at the Inn’s restaurant, as well as the wine thing beforehand, we didn’t want to pig out on chowder (as delicious as it is). It was such a gorgeous day, we were both too warm even in our jeans! We had no idea it was supposed to be that nice, or we would’ve packed shorts! Of course, the poor beach combers would have been “treated” to our pasty white legs, but you can’t please everyone, can you? Besides, Oregonians are supposed to be pasty white… It only makes sense.
Pink Anemones
The tide was out pretty far, so we walked past the Inn after lunch and over to the base of Haystack Rock – the tidepools were full of tiny, pink-at-the-edges anemones, mussels, clams (they’d bored into the sides of the rock, and looked like they’d spring out of their holes any second – if they could move that fast), sea stars, limpets, seaweed and barnacles. Apparently, the Rock itself is covered with puffin nests – but to me they just looked like far away birds circling the Rock like vultures.
After our beach wanderings, we went back to our hotel room to change for wine and dinner. We’d heard that the dining room wasn’t really dressy, but we both like getting dressed up (especially me, with my uber-casual job setting) so we did. Of course, when we walked down the hall to the library I immediately felt awkward – most of the folks were still wearing their beach-combing clothes! That feeling soon left as we tucked ourselves into a corner conversation nook next to a globe that we soon discovered was horribly out of date (though I imagine it’s not as easy to update a globe) – the USSR and Czechoslovakia were still there! So strange. I know it wasn’t that long ago – I mean, I visited Prague when it was still Czechoslovakia in 1992 – but it feels like forever ago.
After two (!!) glasses of wine in the library, we walked upstairs to dinner. The dining room is much larger than the number of people who were seated in it – the only tables they’d filled were those along the windows. The Inn does a prix fixe menu, where the only choice you have to make is which of the two entrees you’d like (stress-free dining is a very good thing). We were told that after the salad and soup, the chef would come out to tell us about the entrees so we could decide which we wanted. But let me back up – I must tell you about the food, to make your mouth water as mine is as I type…
The salad was called “Prawn Caesar,” and was sooo garlicky… It was fantastic, we were just happy we were both eating it! The prawns were divine, and the crouton on top was light, crispy, and covered with roasted garlic. Lovely, lovely, lovely. The homemade bread was wonderful, too – Chris thinks it had sundried tomatoes in it (I don’t usually like them, but the bread was great). The soup was what I was looking forward to most when I first saw the menu – an asparagus soup with bacon bits. I mean, come on. Asparagus soup is wonderful by itself, why add bacon, you ask? Because, as any non-vegetarian knows, everything is better with bacon. No exceptions. Frankly, I’m pretty sure ice cream would be better with bacon. Not that I’m likely to try that anytime soon, I’m just saying.
The soup was, as expected, wonderful. Very peppery, though, and I would have liked to have been able to taste more of the asparagus. (It did make me yearn ever more for the opening day of our farmer’s market, when we’ll get to buy those tiny pinkie-width asparagus for ourselves.) Then out came Chef John to tell us about the grand choice of the evening – mahi mahi or duck confit? Really, probably not a bad option among ‘em. We opted to split the decision – I had the fish and Chris had the duck, and we were both very happy with our decisions. We each had a glass of wine with dinner, as well, though I was still feeling the wine from earlier. I love places that give you decent portion sizes – most Americans would have looked at our plates and said, “Is that all?!?” They’d have been more happy at the all-you-can-eat buffet, with dry chicken wings kept warm under lamps for ages. So, fine – they can have their dry wings. I’ll take my small portion sizes with no leftovers any day. Especially when the quality of the food is so good…
Chris said he wished more restaurants would do those prix fixe menus – it gives the kitchen a chance to focus on one or two things and get them really right. Both our entrees were great – I’m generally not partial to duck (too heavy), but Chris’ duck was almost chicken-like in its texture (though much richer in taste). I’m also not usually up for the experience of pan-seared fish that’s still raw in the middle – and this mahi mahi was cooked all the way through and still moist. So moist! It sat on a bed of couscous on a pineapple slice, and had a few veggies scattered around it – including sweet and crisp snap peas, a real treat.
For dessert, they served white chocolate cheesecake with fresh strawberry sauce. It was sooo good… Almost light (well, light for a cheesecake!), and with that wonderful sourness you really want in a cheesecake. And, just to demonstrate that the fact that it was our anniversary had trickled all the way through the Inn’s staff, “Happy Anniversary” was written in chocolate on each of our plates. Very sweet. And with dessert – because I hadn’t had enough alcohol yet – we had some dark Godiva liqueur. We’d never had any, and now we think we might have to get some at home… It didn’t even taste like alcohol (which, come to think of it, is probably a bad thing).
We stumbled back downstairs, got out of our finery (which hadn’t even seen the outside air!) and settled in to watch “Roman Holiday.” (Chris had never seen it – it’s a fun movie, though I think he didn’t like the ending much.) We opted to live really decadently and ordered milk and cookies midway through the movie – they delivered a plate piled high with chocolate chip cookies and two huge glasses of sweet milk to the door. It’s funny – this place specifically says that kids under 12 aren’t allowed, as it’s designed as an adult getaway, and yet the milk and cookies did nothing but make me feel like a kid. But perhaps that’s part of the point.
Just as we were going to sleep, we noticed some flashing lights outside and opened the curtains to take a look. On the horizon there was a massive lightning storm raging – on the shore there was not only no rain, there was also no wind and it was almost warm. But out at sea, I’d have hated to be one of the ships we saw out there! We pulled on our silk robes and sat out on the patio for awhile, watching the lightning bolts tear through the sky, putting on a show like natural fireworks. It was strange to see such a display of lightning with no thunder at all – I imagined that out on the horizon (however far away it was – Chris estimated the storm was probably 20 miles offshore) there was some fierce thunder. Onshore, it was just like a television show.
Saturday
We both woke up too early, especially as we had no reason to be up. I put on my “comfy pants” (every time I say that, Chris cracks up – but it’s true, it’s what they are) and actually wore my slippers up to the dining room for breakfast. I dunno, it just felt right. The buffet was great – way more food than we could have sampled, even if we were starving (which we weren’t), though we did our best. Irish oatmeal, scrambled eggs, sausage patties, granola, quiche, fresh fruit, homemade bread, scones, muffins – even some cheesecake from the night before! (I’ve never heard of cheesecake for breakfast, but I love the idea…) But honestly, the thing that made me happiest this morning was the sugar bowl on the table. It’s a small, clear dish – kind of shaped like a votive candle-holder – with a lid and spoon. And it’s full of large multi-colored granules of sugar! It’s a little rainbow of sugar in the bowl, and I don’t know why, it just made me so cheerful. That’s the kind of place this is – where even the sugar bowl can be such an unexpected delight.
After breakfast, we got cleaned up and decided to head into the downtown area of Cannon Beach. We thought we might want to do a bit of shopping, and we also wanted to locate the restaurant where we were supposed to be having dinner (the Inns’ restaurant was booked, so they’d directed us to their sister restaurant in town and made reservations for us). We found the restaurant, and then parked the car to wander around. We strolled in and out of shops, up one side of the street and then down the other – Cannon Beach is aesthetically very well designed, as the shops don’t all look the same and there are little nooks and crannies behind some shops with other shops behind. The pathways look as if they’re secret, when clearly they’re not. The shops are fun, though after awhile it’s more of the same. The clothing stores were more “hip” than we were expecting, but also more expensive; while one art shop in particular was much more reasonably priced than we would have thought. (We contemplated buying one painting, but couldn’t figure out where in the heck we’d hang it in our house – I still feel a twinge of guilt that there are already several framed prints stacked in the unused office in our house, homeless pieces of art. Very sad. It felt wrong to add to the pile.)
In one of the downtown parking lots was a pickup truck with a bunch of signs and placards on the back. On each side there was a table set up under a canopy, and over the truck was a large sign that read, “Haystack Rock Awareness Program.” The tables had T-shirts and caps for sale, as well as clear plastic tubs with seawater and some examples of sea life in them, and volunteers stationed at each tub to tell you what you were looking at. Some of the things could be handled as well. It was as if the aquarium had a low-key mobile unit. One of the more interesting things we saw in the tubs was a living sand dollar. Now, I dunno about you, but we didn’t previously think of the sand dollars we see on the beach as being what’s leftover when the organism living inside it dies. And they’re not even so much the shell of the creature, rather its skeleton. The volunteer picked the little guy up, and exposed the thousands of tiny “feet” underneath. It looked like the legs of a millipede or something, only lots of them and with no bug attached. The volunteer said that they’ll scoot along the sandy floor, looking like they’re drifting; they also use the “feet” to feed – they’ll stand themselves up on one side in the water and grab at floating plankton with the “feet,” herding them into the mouth at the center. Fascinating…
Eventually, the cloudy weather we’d woken up to gave way to rain. We made one last stop at the espresso bar we’d seen earlier, mainly because the sign said they sold gelato. The gelato was mediocre (not great, but ice cream in any fashion is hard to screw up entirely) and the service was painfully slow, but it gave us a chance to wait out what we figured was the worst of the showers. We were wrong. It never poured, exactly, but the rain was pretty steady as we hustled our way back to the car. I had my hood to keep me covered, but Chris’ jacket was hoodless and so he was getting pretty wet. Geeks that we are, we’d already pocketed our glasses to prevent spotting. Man, we’re old.
Back in the car, we wondered whether we’d be better off staying indoors for the rest of the night. Even if the restaurant was booked, we could always do room service, right? And besides, that way we could have as much wine with our meal as we wanted, not having to worry about driving back from the restaurant in town. Oh, and we could watch a movie while we ate. Yeah, you can see where this is going. We wanted to veg out, and justified the decision to ourselves all the way back. When we got back to the room, we called the restaurant to cancel. Perhaps next time.
We borrowed “The Motorcycle Diaries” from the Inn’s extensive DVD library and settled into our “comfy pants” again. I figured we’d nod off, having gotten up so early, but we made it all the way through. It’s a good movie about two young friends (one of whom happens to be a young Che Guevara, though that almost seems incidental) who set off from their home in Buenos Aires to see South America on a motorcycle. It’s interesting watching it turn from the road trip of a couple of boys to a turning point in two mens’ lives. Just another example of how a simple excursion (okay, even if it’s supposed to cover 10,000+ kilometers) can turn into a life-changing event. Travel is wonderful.
After the movie, Chris began his new book, Ruth Reichl’s “Garlic and Sapphires” (his anniversary gift) and I began writing this diary. We listened to the Jack Johnson CD as we worked quietly, both really enjoying the excuse to do nothing. At home, there’s no excuse. There’s always dishes or laundry to be done, homework that we’re behind on… And even if there’s none of that, there’s a television program we’ve recorded and which we really “should” watch. This “dolce far niente,” as the Italians call it, is really sublime.
We went to the wine thing again this afternoon, bringing our books and tucking into our corner by the globe again. I finally managed to finish “Long Way Round,” which is good because it’s due back to the library in two days – and it means I can pick up one of the books in my bedside pile. I do love that moment when I’m finishing one book and I’m not yet sure what I’ll be reading next. It’s like when I get home from one trip and I’m looking forward to beginning the planning of the next one. It’s a fun state of limbo, knowing no choice is a “bad” one, and not sure where the next adventure will take me.
We’re now lounging in the room again; the screen door cracked, we’re listening to the surf. We’ve had our fill of the cookies from the jar at the front desk, the scones by the tea caddy in the lobby, as well as a few soothing mugs of tea. I honestly feel as though I’ll never be hungry again in my entire life. Chris noted the time when I said that (6:05pm) and said, “Just wait, that’ll change.” It’s now an hour later, and nothing’s changed. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve felt hungry all day. If this isn’t decadence, I’m not sure what is. (And I’m still thinking a nice bowl of soup will suffice this evening, thankyouverymuch.)
We played an Italian language game, called “Who is Oscar Lake?” for a bit, and then watched “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason.” We did end up getting room service – a sandwich, soup and salad and a half-bottle of Domaine Drouhain Pinot Noir – and that was more than enough for the evening.
Stephanie Inn Tulip
Sunday
Again, I woke up earlier than I’d intended (8am) – but in the end, it was a good thing. It wasn’t supposed to be nice weather, it was supposed to rain like Saturday. But as I lay in bed Chris opened the curtains to reveal a beautifully sunny day! Low tide was at 8:25am, so we thought we’d take advantage of the weather and go look at the Haystack Rock tidepools again.
As we walked toward the Rock, we realized the Haystack Rock Awareness Program truck that we’d seen in “downtown” Cannon Beach the day before was there. As we were wandering around the tidepools, we saw they’d set up signs reminding people to only walk on sand or bare rocks, as there were living creatures everywhere, and there were a couple volunteers circulating among the beachcombers answering questions. One gal came over to talk to us, and we said we’d seen them the day before – she said that was for Earth Day (which was technically Friday). We still don’t know if they’re out at the tidepools on a regular basis, or if it’s just sporadic, but the gal was so helpful. We’d been wondering what the bizarre trails we’d seen in the sand were, and she said they were probably snails darting around underwater (though now that I think about it, “darting” probably isn’t the right word to describe something as sloth-like as a snail). We’d also noticed what we thought were jellies washed up as well, and she confirmed that they were probably juveniles, that they’re a variety that’s related to the Portuguese man-o-war, but that they probably wouldn’t sting (because they were undeveloped juveniles, and because the tentacles were likely to be underneath the bodies rather than on top where we might touch them). Still, “probably” wasn’t good enough for me, so despite her encouragement to try to find the “fin” on one and place it in the water to see the cobalt blue undersides, we decided we’d rather not.
She also pointed out some puffins flying off the Rock, which was great because we wouldn’t have seen them otherwise. As soon as she pointed them out, they were – of course – immediately recognizable. They flapped their wings so quickly in comparison to the gulls and cormorants around them that they looked like hummingbirds. Their bodies are also more stocky, and they have basically no necks. We weren’t able to get a glimpse of them on the Rock itself, as they apparently nest on the west (ocean-facing) side. It was fun to look, though, and I got what I hope will be some good pictures of the other occupants around the Rock – sea stars, anemones, and mussels.
After our morning walk, we went back to the Inn for another spectacular breakfast. I swear, I love me a big, out-of-the-ordinary, over-the-top breakfast. I’m glad I hardly ever get them – they wouldn’t be so special if they were everyday occurrences, and I’d probably weigh quite a bit more than I do already! When we’d finished breakfast we brought coffee, hot chocolate and (I know, I can’t believe it myself) a piece of cheesecake back to our room to enjoy while we got packed and ready to leave. We opened the patio doors and sat out there one last time, watching the ocean. (It seems strange to me that the sound we all associate with “ocean,” waves crashing onto the beach, is really the sound of the beach. Out at sea, in the middle of the water, it doesn’t sound like that at all.)
We got ready slowly, not wanting to leave (I said, “Checkout’s at noon? I don’t want to leave here one second before that!”). Sure, it wasn’t the kind of place we’d have stayed had we not had the gift certificate, and it’s way more than we would spend on a weekend getaway in general – but it was so nice, and we had such a great time, that it all felt worth it. And actually, the weekend ended with a bit of comedy – let’s just say we had a toilet malfunction, and had to call housekeeping for an emergency intervention. I have never in my life seen a toilet impersonate a geyser quite so well. It all ended peacefully, and we had a good laugh about the whole thing with the housekeeping gal. Perhaps they’ll add plungers to the in-room amenities in future.
On the way home, we stopped in outer Beaverton for a treat we used to have quite a bit of – bubble tea. We weren’t hungry for lunch (surprise, surprise), but we were in the neighborhood and it’d been quite awhile since we’d had our beloved bubble tea (it was a real favorite the last time Chris’ family came to visit, and they’ve talked about it often since). Then we stopped at Target and got gas at Costco at the new Wilsonville mega-plaza. It’s crazy, and visually really unappealing, but it’s certainly good for saving time running errands. Then, it was finally time to go home.
We turned right around and did a mammoth grocery shopping trip, and then Chris ensconced himself in the kitchen. He’d decided he was in the mood for coconut cream pie, which he then decided he wanted to make himself. And then when we couldn’t find unsweetened coconut shavings in the baking aisle, Chris went off to see if the Asian food aisle might have them. I continued on with the shopping, and after awhile he returned – holding two whole coconuts. I looked at him in disbelief, and he just shrugged and said, “I thought I’d give it a try myself.” Uh-huh. He spent about an hour opening and peeling the coconuts just to get the meat out – crazy man. I think the pie’s in the fridge setting now, and I hope it turns out well or he’s going to be very unhappy…
So, tomorrow it’s back to work and back to reality. I’ll be shadowing my boss at one of his mediations on Monday, to see what it’s like from the neutral’s side of things. Wednesday is my last photography class. And in two weeks we’ll be in New York for my aunt’s birthday party. Man, I cannot believe it’s already nearly May… Where on earth does the time go?!? I really need to get my China-researching butt in gear!
Monday
I shadowed my boss for a mediation which unfortunately didn’t settle. I say “unfortunately” because I would have liked to see the process as it worked its way through to resolution. Perhaps next time.
Also, I forgot something earlier when I mentioned that I was between books. I brought two new books to the beach with us, in case I finished the one I was reading, and because I couldn’t decide what I wanted to read next. The two choices were “A House Somewhere,” a collection of short stories and excerpted works about living abroad, and “The Wall,” a fictionalized account of the Jewish uprising in the Warsaw ghetto during WWII. As I think about these options, I can’t believe I could have been in a mood to read one or the other – they’re so very different, how could they both be produced from the same book interim?? Who knows. In the end, I didn’t end up picking either one over the weekend. Last night as I was getting ready for bed, I chose “The Wall,” though I haven’t started it yet. I don’t know what it means that I picked the depressing one, we’ll see if I have the fortitude to stick with it for long.
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