John Whitham's Visit

  We had a wonderful visit from Bill's good friend, John Whitham who grew up next to Bill in their Sheffield neighborhood in England. Bill invited his brothers to come visit as each of them remembered growing up next door to John.

 It was delightful watching and listening to this group reminisce!

We took John to see many places including Newport. Here you can see where special floats have been built for the sea lions in the bay. Newport Bridge is in the background.

 Bill and John

 Shopping

 Yaquina Head at the north end of the town of Newport, Oregon

 We had especially nice weather this last September. We drove on the beach at Cape Kiwanda in Pacific City.

 John decided to check out the cold Pacific Ocean.

 John belongs to a canoe club in his hometown of Beckbury, Shropshire, England. He enjoys every opportunity to be on the water, so we took him kayaking on the Salmon River near Cascade Head.

 Here they are approaching where the river meets the ocean. There were several boats fishing for Fall Chinook salmon.

 It can get a little rough in the deep and narrow section where the river meets the ocean.

 They pulled their kayak up on the beach and watched the fisherman.

 Here is one boat taking pictures of their catch.

 I think they enjoyed themselves :-).

 John wanted to do something to help out, so Bill showed him how to use our wood splitter.

 Next we took him to Camp Sherman to see the headwaters of the Metolius River.

 The local store is a "must see"!

 It is filled with every kind of fishing fly you could ever see!

 Bill and John purchased an ice cream for themselves and proceeded to eat them by the river just outside of the store.

 They had company!

 John and Becky. I don't normally wear red and purple together, but that is the color of my compression stocking I had to wear after breaking my ankle.

 Beautiful fall colors!

 A view of our car in front of the store

 We took John to Todd Lake and enjoyed hiking around it.

 A view of the mountain near Elk Lake where we kayaked and canoed with John

 We took John to the top of Pilot Butte in Bend

 and this was the view.

 A lizard trying to blend into the environment

 We camped at Tumalo in Bend, and this was a peaceful spot by the river.

 We took John to Drake Park in Bend where he could kayak some more :-).

 The last thing we all did together was watch the eclipse of the moon this last fall. It was spectacular!