Tillamook County

Rockaway Beach is in Tillamook County, Oregon. Besides it's beaches, it is famous for fishing out of Tillamook Bay at Garibaldi, and for it's happy cows, which produce the famous Tillamook cheese and butter and ice cream. Jill insists that we go to the little, old fashioned bakery in Garibaldi. We all went the first morning, and after that we just sent her on a donut run. Isaac and Irene like sprinkles.

Jill, who has not an once of body fat, eats at least four different items every morning! Grandpa indulges in two, while I stick to one big apple fritter. Yum.

The lumber trains no longer run on the coast line, since the main line was washed out several years ago, but in summer a steam train carries passengers between Garibaldi and Rockaway Beach. The old display train is always there, and we have many photos over the years of kids climbing on it. It is a required stop, just across Hwy 101 from the bakery.

Then we walk the docks in Garibaldi and check out the fishing boats that go out from Tillamook Bay.

Further down the road is the Blue Heron Cheese Factory. They no longer make cheese there, but they feature a wonderful French Brie, and there are lots of samples to taste. They also have a petting zoo, where some of the animals look mighty strange, indeed.

As many times as we have visited the Tillamook Cheese Factory, we never tire of watching the cheese making process. It's mesmerizing to watch the conveyor belts going here and there with different sizes and colors of cheese, sorted here, weighed there, shrink wrapped over there. Over the years the process has become much more automated. We no longer see the cheese makers cutting and turning the curd by hand. But it's still interesting. The gift shop is great, too, and you can sample and buy the cheese, or anything cow related.

But best of all is the Tillamook ice cream!