Going, going back to…Manzanita Beach! I don’t recall the year my family last visited Manzanita Beach, but it had been at least a decade. It was so much smaller than I remembered! Really only two tiny streets.

We sat and had lunch outside at a sandwich place before deciding what we were going to do with our day. The couple sitting at the table with us were European and seemed semi-mortified by their son, who was just acting the way little kids do. You know, obnoxious!

The Best Costume for Manzanita beach was the batik ice cream cone dress and Saltwater sandals, of course. Too bad I had to wear the leggings underneath, but still: cute. Both of the dogs are smiling in this picture!

I don’t know why, but I thought the “Oregon Cyber Café” looked hysterical. What is this, the 90’s, Oregon?

Renting the “fun cycles” (as they’re called) was something that I enjoyed with my family years ago, but I was concerned that it would be too difficult to manage the dogs (that pesky “leash dogs” rule) AND cycle at the same time.

As it turned out, it was impossible! But once we just let the dogs off the leashes and let them run around the beach near us, everything worked out beautifully. Renting the bikes for an hour was one of my favorite parts of the trip! You can see some more shots on Josh’s Instagram here. I couldn’t carry my giant heavy camera with me on the bike.

I wore my windbreaker during the bike ride. Necessary! Manzanita beach was extremely windy.

After we returned the fun cycles, we went back to the beach to walk around for a bit.

We leashed the pets until we got closer to the water’s edge.

Then we were free to romp!

In spite of the wind, Manzanita Beach was really pretty. Not very populated, either.

When I stayed with my family years ago, we were in one of these hotels right on the beach, with a pool. Josh and I considered staying in Manzanita for a night, but it was far too late to book anything. Manzanita has a very limited number of places to stay.

Hey little sand turtle.

The weather got progressively more overcast during our time on the beach, but I’m glad it was sunny when we were on the bikes.

Braving the cold for a little while.

Once the sun had completely gone away, we decided it was time to move north–to Cannon Beach. More about that later!

It’s Friday?! This week went by so fast. Yesterday I was a little stressed out, taking Maggie to the vet. She started limping Wednesday night for no particular reason and yesterday morning she was not putting any weight on her hind right leg, so I decided it warranted a vet visit. The vet pronounced her right knee “inflamed” and prescribed rest, anti-inflammatory meds and pain meds for the next couple of weeks. Poor Maggie! You know she HATES to rest. Today I’ll be doing all that post-vacation cleaning of the house that I didn’t have time to do earlier this week, as I was busy busy busy getting ready for the show. Ugh, cleaning.