Our Nest on Wheels

by Steve

You may recall that Lewis and Clark were sent out to explore the land that the US had acquired in the Louisiana purchase from France. What you might not recall is that this land did not stretch all the way to the Pacific Ocean. This little fact did not stop them from continuing all the way to the ocean, arriving at the mouth of the Columbia River at what is now the border between Oregon and Washington. Of course they claimed the land for the US, despite other nations' claims to it, including Russia, Spain, the British--not to mention the first nations (whom nobody did bother to mention.) Eventually, Spain and Russia dropped their claims, leaving the US and the British claiming to the Oregon territory, which stretched from the southern border of Oregon to well into what is now British Columbia.

The two countries basically agreed to joint occupation of the territory; this lasted from 1818 to 1846, when the border between the 2 nations was set at the 49th parallel.  (Remember "54-40 or Fight!") The British got the whole of Vancouver Island, even though a portion of it extends below the 49th parallel, and the boundary was set at the strait between Vancouver Island and the mainland.

The problem is that there are actually two straits between Vancouver Island and the mainland. The US assumed that the agreement meant the border was the Haro Strait, right beside Vancouver Island. This would make the San Juan Islands part of the US. The British assumed it meant the Rosario Strait, giving the islands to them. Settlers from both countries arrived on the islands, staking their claims. Joint occupation continued, as it had for around 40 years, with both sides getting along with each other. Until the problem in 1859 with the pig.

Here's a summary of the incident, from The Pig War, thanks to the National Park Service:

Both the US and the British began sending troops and cannon to the island, establishing camps, and generally escalating tensions. This despite the fact that the officers from both sides would share whiskey and cigars together, and the soldiers would worship together on Sunday.

The British had the much nicer camp, on a sheltered bay with beautiful views. They spent their time building nice structures and making their camp a good place the live.

The American camp was on the southern end of San Juan Island, on a hill in an exposed place with lots of wind. They spent their time doing military drills.

Fortunately, cooler heads on both sides prevailed, and the stand-off was deescalated a bit. The British commander was not willing to go to war over a pig, and when Washington finally heard of the incident, they dispatched Winfield Scott to contain the situation. He arrived a few months later and proposed a joint military occupation. This lasted until 1872 (over 12 years) until the border dispute was settled by the Kaiser of Germany acting as the arbitrator.

Now the American and English camps are part of a National Monument, and you can visit both and gain a little insight into this strange chapter of our history. Fortunately, no shots were fired by either side in the pig war, other than the shot that killed the pig. The Kaiser ruled in favor of the US, giving the US the San Juan Islands. The British accepted the ruling and immediately withdrew their troops. The islands have been at peace ever since.

I think there's probably a lesson here about letting small stuff escalate, about getting along with your neighbors, and about peacefully resolving disputes.  I'll let readers draw their own conclusions.

As you probably have figured out by now, if you are an occasional or regular reader of this blog, this is not strictly a chronological account of our travels. We write more occasionally than regularly, and we don't necessarily summarize or review all the places where we have been. We try to find something interesting to write about, and if we skip a few places, well that doesn't really matter to us.

by Steve

We've never spent much time in Oregon. We had a night on the coast back in the 1980s when we lived in California, but that barely counts. I think we went from Vancouver to Los Angeles down the coast road, but we did it in about a week, so it's a bit of a blur. Plus it was 30 years ago. So we planned six weeks along the Oregon coast for this summer to see and experience as much as possible. We stayed in three different locations and took over 600 pictures, so selecting a dozen or so for this post will be a challenge.

We started with the first two weeks of May at Harris Beach State Park. This park is near Brookings, Oregon, which is just a bit north of the California border. It's in what's known as the "banana belt" of Oregon, where it tends to be sunnier earlier in the year. We had mostly sunny days, with just a couple days of rain. The picture above shows the beach at our park. Jane enjoyed countless hours of roaming the beach in search of interesting shells. We also got our best sunsets here.

In many areas, the rocks along the coast are shaped by the meeting of the earth's plates. As the Pacific Plate slides under the North American Plate, the rock layers get pushed up on a angle. In lots of places, the angle of these rocks is very visible and makes for dramatic cliffs.

And of course there are a lot of lighthouses, many of which are now open for touring. After we'd seen about a half dozen lighthouses, we decided that we didn't need to tour any more. They are all rather similar. Instead, we amused ourselves by reciting bits of what we knew would be on each tour: "This is a Fresnel lens, developed in France..."

Our next stop along the Oregon coast was near Coos Bay, where we stayed for two weeks at Sunset Bay State Park. Again, we had mostly sunny days, with only a little rain. Not bad for May. Next door to our park is another state park called Shore Acres. This is the former estate of Louis Simpson, who built a mansion on a bluff overlooking to ocean as a Christmas present to his wife. After 15 years or so, his wife died, and the mansion burned to the ground a few months later. Within 6 years, however, Louis had remarried and moved into a second mansion that he had built. Eventually he sold the estate to the state. The mansion was used as barracks briefly during World War II, and then razed in 1948 because it was in such bad shape. So now nothing really remains of the old mansions. But the state has restored the formal gardens, which are fairly extensive. Jane still misses her garden, so having these gardens right next door, with the freedom to visit as long and as often as she liked, was quite a treat.

Going north from Coos Bay are vast stretches of sand dunes known as the Oregon dunes. We had not expected to find extensive sand dunes along the coast. While not as tall as Michigan's Sleeping Bear dunes, these are probably longer, and a bit more wild. We hiked a bit in them, but hiking in dunes is slow going.

But the real action is along the shore, where lava has met the ocean, creating fissures and blow-holes. The following two pictures were taking at the same spot, just 23 seconds apart.

Our final two weeks on the Oregon coast were at Fort Stevens State Park, near Astoria, right where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean. Here the coast is more beachlike, and people actually go swimming here. They don't swim long, as the water is cold, but the bottom is sandy and relatively free of obstructions, except for the occasion shipwreck.

Just a little south we find Haystack Rock at Cannon Beach, which should have puffins nesting on it. Well, they might have been there, but we weren't able to see any. We'll have to write more on the search for the elusive puffin later, as this search has taken us from coast to coast.