Our great host in Portland, Uli, left us in a good spot. After 10 minutes, a car came from the opposite direction, they had seen us, and took us.
They are the Ayers family: the mother and two daughters, which have as well grandchildren. The mother was the wife of Jimmy Ayers, a Nascar car pilot. When he came after the war, he thought what he liked the most, the race cars, and he went to work at Indianapolis. 2 years later, he got a wheel. He and his wife invented a safer helmet. But it was stolen by Bell Helmets, which is now a big helmet producer.
All their big family likes to watch races, except one daughter. But it was too hard to see her husband racing.
View on Cannon Beach
They dropped us in a magnificent place where we could see the water columns ejected by Humpback whales.
In this place we got a hitch-hike from an couple of old people. She was talking all the time, and he grunting something from time to time. They lived all their life there, in Oregon, on the coast. They regret that their children spread all over US. They made a big detour to leave us in a good spot. They wanted to buy us some food, and when they dropped us, they wanted to give us some money.
At the gas station, the first person I asked, gave us a ride to the beach. Of course, it was not at all on his way. Jack worked in Chicago as a teacher, a couple of years ago he moved on the coast of Oregon. He loves photography.
We spent the night on the beach, in an very beautiful camping in the forest. It rained quite often.
We were sure that finding a ride it will be an easy task, because a lot of cars were stopping to see the view. After 2 hours of waiting and 10 times asking, and the frustration to feel like a bump with a laptop, we got all our luggage and walked the 2 hours hilly trail to end up in the road, in the middle of nowhere.
After 10 minutes, we got a ride from Robert, a real-estate agent who was doing some work for a local fair. He confirmed, the tourists don’t take hitch-hikers. He let us at the fair.
10 minutes later, we got a ride from a hippy couple, in an old truck. We felt a little what’s countryside living. They were going to get their child from school. He did a lot of travelling in his youth… I think he is 5 years older than me. When they left us, they offered us some weed. Refusing, they insisted to give us some money. Refusing, they insisted to give us a flash-light, then a knife, then something to eat… We had to accept the flash-light, otherwise, I guess they would have give us their car.
It was the day of the gifts, this morning Emilie received an amplificator for the cello from Uli, then this head-band with red flowers from the Ayers family, finally we accepted the flashlight, and more than this, these encounters, this people we met were just full of generosity.