July 16, 2003 Longview has a park area that borders Kessler, one of the main streets across town. On the other side of the street are churches and large houses. This is one of the churches. And one of the larger houses along Kessler. Shortly after we turned on Ocean Beach Highway we went by the Thai restaurant we ate at the night before. It doesn't look like much, but the food was good and all of the tables were full. One of the many waterways along Hwy 4 as we headed west. Hwy 4 is a much more scenic route west from the Rainier, OR/Longview, WA area than Hwy 30 so the trip across the bridge yesterday was well worth the problems with the traffic. If you look closely across the water, you'll see a great blue heron sitting upright on a stump. Another osprey has taken advantage of this perch for its nest. The osprey began to circle the nest before we left. Road side geology... A tugboat struggled up river pulling its heavy load. This part of the river was fairly calm. This shot was taken looking east. Another shot looking west... Cathlamet is a town named for the Indians who lived here and means "stone". We had espresso sitting outside the restaurant on the left. When we stopped for water on Puget Island, this cat started to walk towards us. The ferry had a map of the Astoria area to help us locate where we were. The ferry holds about 9 vehicles and is the link across the river when the Longview bridge is closed at night for its 18 month of repairs. The riparian landscape was great and the breeze off the river refreshed us. The next 20 miles were hilly but worth it as we rode into the Astoria area. For safety, Fort Clatsop was built with high walls on the outside; this allowed all of the rain to flow into the center courtyard though. Ron is a great deal happier than the men of the Corps were during their went winter. I'm also happy -- it's been a great trip!! And here we are at the "end". Atlantic sand to Pacific sand -- and all of the rivers followed by Meriwether Lewis and the Corps of Discovery.