HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
We were off, and up the coast again, past the sea otters, seals and sea lions at the Oregon Aquarium, as well as a stop at the Tillamook Cheese Factory, where from a viewing platform you can watch blocks of cheddar divvied up into bricks, bars, and slices - taste yummy samples and buy the best ice cream this side of San Francisco. There are more cows in the county than people. When we got out of the car, the air smelled of earthy, sweet, pungent, farm-fresh dung.
Almost near the top of the coast, just off US 101 and nestled within the tiny artist colony of Cannon Beach, was the last of our Oregon sleepovers: Two nights at The Oceanspray Inn, part of the Haystack Lodgings.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
Making our way north up the Oregon Coast, past the sea lion caves in Florence (sorely lacking even a single creature -- they'd all swum off, we were told), and the vistas spanning in all directions from Cape Perpetua, through countless curving coastlines along US 101, we wound our way into the little town of Yachats. Ahead was our destination the much heralded resort spa, The Overleaf Lodge.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
From the fishing lodge-turned-inn, first made famous by Clark Gable, we shoved off for the Oregon coast. As we made our way south, inching toward Northern California, the forest trees began to get thicker and taller, finally blotting out the sky. Then, a sign: Redwood National Park. We saw a bunch of cars and RVs pulled off on the roadside, next to a trailhead, and walked, literally agog, among the giants, unchanged for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
The backdrops changed quickly, from forest to highway, then long sloping fields finally giving us a sweet first gulp of ocean air. We had finally made it to US Highway 101, on our way north to Gold Beach's Inn of the Beachcomber.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
From the vast, deep stillness of Crater Lake and its latent volcano, we drove down the mountain switchbacks, through dense forest, and into Oregon farm country, valleys belted by smooth, low hills. "This sure looks like California," I said. Seeing as we were only fifty miles from the state border, it may as well been, except for the line on the map.
As we made our way East, we crisscrossed the Rogue River, a rumbling churn of water cutting through the terrain. The sun was going down, we were exhausted. Up ahead in the distance, we saw shimmering lights - the welcoming neon of The Weasku Inn.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
It was time to say aloha to our luxury digs in Sisters, and head south once more... with a pit-stop in Chemult, Oregon, where it's best not to eat food unless you have antacid at the ready (we learned too late).
We drove along miles of straight road with nary a car to be seen in either direction. Soon the radio was picking up nothing, and I mean nothing, on either frequency. Welcome to the wilderness, city people! Entertain yourselves!
Finally we saw signs for Crater Lake, then Diamond Lake, and at last, The Diamond Lake Resort.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
Out of the snow-capped mountains, and away from the 30s-style deco ski lodge, like a country song, we drove through the pouring rain into the high desert. The smell of sticky spruce trees permeated the car as we transitioned into low mountain terrain, passing dusty buttes and finally farm after farm.
After a while longer, we pulled into Sisters, right up to our pitstop for the next two nights, The Five Pine Lodge.
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
Heading due South from Portland, we wound our way through easy switchbacks, up and up, through endless forests...higher and higher...until we thought we were going to lose our minds with all that vast wild, solitude, and space.
Little surprise, then, that our destination was The Timberline Lodge, probably most famous for its deliciously spooky exteriors in Stanley Kubrick's film "The Shining."
HotelChatter Maven Annie0007 recently wrapped up a two-week jaunt through Oregon, taking her from the mountains and high desert to the lakes and coast. Along with the terrain variety, she stayed in a wide array of accommodations, from a 50s-style campground setting along a starlit lake, to a luxury cottage surrounded by deer and wildflowers, and a 1930s mountain lodge made famous in a classic horror movie. This week we'll be running her exclusive hotel reviews. If you have any questions, hit us on the tipline.
The first stop on our own personal Oregon Trail was The Park Lane Inn and Suites in Portland. At first glance, this all-suites hotel doesn't give great curb appeal: it sits at the top of a steep hill seemingly far away from the action of downtown, with a big cheesy AAA-Approved placard in the parking lot, and little signs of life in the lobby.
This is definitely a place to crash, not to party, although the 6am garbage truck just below our window seemed to conspire against us.
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by annie0007
