Day 16 | 13.09.2018 Stevenson, WA - Newport, OR

The night at Columbia River was very beautiful, even though we could hear kilometer-long freight trains passing by every few minutes. We continued up the Columbia River towards Portland. A few miles after Stevenson, we crossed the river using a Mout Bridge ($2) to go up to Vista House. Great view from up there.

In Portland, we had identified Pioneer Court Square as our destination. It is like the central square of Portland where you can relax and observe the life of the Rose City. Unfortunately, my employer had a problem with that.

It seemed like IKEA was preparing a huge event here and the square was blocked due to construction work. Too bad. So we had a coffee at Starbucks and visited the park on the waterfront with its many bridges.

Today's destination should be Newport. A popular seaside resort directly on the Pacific about 2 hours southwest of Portland. We found a very cheap motel called "Money Safer". And it was also very nice. Great location and very spacious, perfect.

After checking in, we explored the town a bit. The historic district was advertised and it did not promise too much. We found a very original fishing village here.

Here we could watch the fishermen working live. The smell of fish was everywhere. Very different from the touristy Warnemünde with its old stream. Here it still smelled of sweat and hard work. At the famous Rogue Brewery's brewpub, my mom had black mussels.

She said they were the best she ever had. Cooked in a white wine sauce with lots of garlic and small pieces of sausage. The slightly grumpy waiter, who I assume is also a fisherman who was just helping out, also praised the sauce. We also ordered 7 of the 30 beers on offer to try. That's for dad! :-) For the past 30 years, ROGUE has released a new beer every year. Accordingly, the selection was very diverse.

A few meters away from all the fish processing docks, there was one for sea lions. And they are regular guests here... over 30 of them lazily lying in the evening sun... impressive and cute. On a small rocky island there were countless other animals.