This weekend looks to be lovely with sunshine! The Long Beach Peninsula has early morning clam tides Saturday and Sunday so you can limit and be back in time for a warm hot tub and our signature breakfast by the fireplace at 9:30. All of our friends have reported limiting quickly during the last clam dig–so maybe you can too! Of course, you don’t have to dig clams –or else send the sweetheart out to dig clams while you sleep in could be a plan too! Simply languishing in Boreas Inn’s fluffy feather beds in our oceanside Long Beach, WA lodging will make your weekend divine. We will set up dinners out in our favorite haunts. Whether you clam or not, you will dig it at Boreas!
The hunt for the beautiful and delicious bivalve will resume this weekend on the Long Beach, Washington Peninsula. The digs are late afternoon/ early evening with low tide Saturday, Feb.18, is at 4:13 p.m. (0.0 feet), and on Sunday, Feb.19, at 5 p.m. (-0.2 feet). Plan on being on the beach one to two hours before evening low tide. You will truly feel you have earned your supper when you dig and clean your clams and then have the privilege of dining on the most gourmet clam of them all, the Siliqua Patula! Stay at beautiful Boreas Inn on the beach in Long Beach, Washington and we will loan you clam guns and Bill might even show you how to clean your clams and may, even, if you’re very lucky, show you how to cook and EAT them! The spring clam tides will be announced soon, so there will be many more weekends with a chance to dig those glorious bivalves!
Personally, New Years’ Eve isn’t my favorite holiday. I think of doing taxes, of what I haven’t accomplished this year, what I need to accomplish next year… but every year, our guests jolly me into appreciating the holiday more than I would were we not innkeepers. After all, 2012 sounds more well-rounded than 2011. I like even numbers. THERE WILL BE FIREWORKS at the beach, in view from Boreas, on New Years Eve!! I almost forgot!
The Christmas tree is still fresh and lovely for some reason (Bill takes good care of the tree!) and we haven’t tired of the decorations so prettily placed by our decorating crew the first weekend in December. We had a great time decorating this year. This year was extra special with a sweet blend of family and beloved guests who are now family too. We are hoping that we fill up for New Years’ weekend. We are always filled up after Christmas but not this year! Groupon and Living Social may be the reason—people shopping for bargains. Frankly, for what Boreas offers, we are a bargain! But we’re offering the Carpe Diem, Walk-in Special rate starting today. $150 for luxury and pampering! Even the cottage is open this weekend.
Our guest list so far is a fun one and Odell will be here to help us dismantle the decorations if we can work around our desire to watch football…at Mark and Helen’s Lost Roo, of course! Go DUCKS! Everyone is invited to take DOWN the decorations with us and go to The Roo!
Fresh Dungeness Crabcakes and Champagne on Sunday morning, New Years’ Day, sounds pretty perfect for one of our FOUR courses, and Bill will do beautiful work on the crab cakes as always and I will bake pastries, whip up sauces and make the fruit entrée glow so that consuming all that vitamin C seems very sexy. Well…it is! But I hope that if it’s going to be cloudy this week end, that it is also stormy so we can feel comforted by the fireplaces. But I also hope that there is a break in the weather so we can go for a fresh walk to start the New Year. We have been fortunate with fine weather this fall.
Come stay with us this weekend at the prettiest inn on the Long Beach Peninsula—featherbeds, down comforters, fireplaces, fine and fancy breakfast fare, freshly baked brownies, and the incredibly-wonderful-almost-brand-new hot tub for two with a little aromatherapy—mint and eucylptus, to soften your skin. Boreas Bed & Breakfast Inn is posh but hip, fun, but mellow and very food-crazy with a great location on the beach in Long Beach Washington. Relaxation is the best way to start the next banner year—2012! Happy New Year!
Boreas Inn is all yours, decorated with love for the 2011 Holiday Season! Utilize one room for the ultimate peaceful and romantic time or bring family and friends and fill all five rooms for a flat rate of $595 plus tax per night for two nights minimum. (Ten people maximum–kids over 8 are fine.) This is a $320 per night savings. Arrive on the 23rd, if you would like three nights at this great rate or stay a little later. This ready-made holiday removes the stress and lets you relax and enjoy the season. All you need to do is bring your own gifts for under the tree. The stockings are already hung by the chimney with care–but you can bring your own! Gather your friends and family and enjoy this unique opportunity to rent the entire inn, one room or all five of Boreas’ beautiful guest rooms for your Christmas Holiday. This once-a-year special even includes our signature breakfasts with a Champagne Brunch on Christmas Day! If you would like to arrive on December 23rd, you can extend your special deal to three nights. We will arrange your holiday dinners too! (The Inn is also available for Hannukah starting December 20th–complete with menorah and candles!) You can see lots of pics of our 2011 decorations on www.facebook.com/BoreasInn!
This magical star-lit view can be yours for Christmas!
Bill and I just returned from our brief weekly disappearing act to eat Serious Pizza at Cape Disappointment State Park in Ilwaco on the Long Beach, Washington Peninsula. First of all, this park is NOT a disappointment–it is our favorite Washington State Park. It was named “Cape Disappointment” because in 1788, Captain John Meares, a fur trader, was disappointed because this was not the opening to the river–and is, in fact, is located just north of the infamous Mouth of the Columbia River! Cape Disappointment is also home to the National Park housing Maya Lin’s “Confluence Project” honoring the Indian tribes Lewis and Clark encountered at the confluences of the rivers on their journey west. Captain Clark and 11 of the “Corps of Discovery” hiked all over the land that is now Cape Disappointment State Park and from McKenzie Head, saw their first panoramic view of the Pacific Ocean! Then they proceeded to hike north up the Peninsula, right across the property that is now Boreas Inn, located on the 1805 high water mark. So you get to sleep right on the Lewis and Clark Trail!
Of course, one of the most scenic parts of the Park are the two lighthouses, The North Head Lighthouse and the Cape Disappointment Lighthouse. The North Head is easily explored by parking in the lot and walking down to the lighthouse on a road alongside the rock face overlooking the Pacific Ocean and just north of Benson Beach. This is a place to linger. All day. The waves, huge in the winter but omnipresent, are hypnotic. The color of the water seems to change from blue to green to gray in a storm, but always a stunning contrast with the white tips of the peaks of the waves. Whale watching from the North Head is often rewarding. We look for the clumps of kelp offshore and occasionally see the spouts. The pelicans, eagles, many varieties of gulls, terns and a huge array of seabirds make this spot make for some of the best birdwatching in the West. Cape D lighthouse is a hike from the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center (in winter and anytime, the best view of the Mouth of the Columbia and the jetties), around Dead Man’s Cove. Our guests come from around the world to see these two lighthouses, within miles of Boreas!
I mentioned Serious Pizza! Well–seriously now, take the combination of a wood-fired pizza oven, burning cherry and apple, the “00 fino” flour imported from Italy, imported cheeses, meats from a great Seattle butcher chop and a location at Waikiki Beach at Cape D (as we call it), and you have not only the recipe for the best wood-fired pizza in Southwest Washington, but a spectacular setting near the amphitheater at Cape D State Park. With eagles flying overhead (perhaps looking hungrily at your pizza-or maybe at your dog) and osprey circling around with crows and gulls harrassing them, you have an experience you will never forget. Our favorite pizza is, you guessed it, “The Boreas”–the vegetarian pizza with garlic olive oil base, sundried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, olives and pepperoni. How special is it to have a pizza named after Boreas Inn? State Parks built Jim and Chi, the purveyors of this fine pizza, a permanent structure so that visitors to the park, including campers staying in the 240 campsites, can have pizza! We call ahead to avoid waiting perhaps an hour for the most memorable pizza. It’s truly Neopolitano–a thin delectable crust and just the right amount of cheese for a non-guilt producing light meal. They also have wood-fired oysters and mouth-watering wood-fired wings. Homemade ice cream and brownies….oh my! Watch for Jim and Chi’s Serious Pizza to come soon to the town of Long Beach!
I have attached a very fine video about Cape Disappointment State Park to this blog! It stars a few of our favorite State Park employees and some of the best scenery this area has to offer. The Park is located 10 minutes from Boreas Inn. We are soooo lucky to have Cape D State Park in our backyard. So come to Boreas Inn and we will direct you to our favorite park, Cape Disappointment! Enjoy the YouTube about Cape D.!
SandSations, in Long Beach, Washington, was voted #1 Best Sand Castle contest in the USA by Coastal Living Magazine! The sand sculpture weekend is coming right up on July 20th-24th. Boreas still has rooms available if you would like to build castles and sculptures or if you simply enjoy marveling at the artistry of the masters, watching teams working together to achieve a goal and learn how the process works. I used to participate in the Cannon Beach competition for around 12 years and my team used to place #1 in our sand sculpting masters category. We sculpted completely by hand. We were consistently top prize winners–that is, until this group of architects from Seattle were added to our category and used sophisticated forms and packing devices…and we didn’t always place first after that. (Coincidentally, we had one of those Seattle architect/sand sculptors as a guest at the Inn!) But talking about immediate gratification–you take a plot of sand, dig up a pile, decide who on your team does what well (I’m good at packing, making hands and letters) then together, the team works magic and achieves a goal within hours. Nothing artificial…just sand and water. It is wonderful! We used to finish off our plots with perfectly smooth borders and beautifully worked lettering. I haven’t seen anything to match our fine finish work anywhere. We usually constructed the sculpture with a theme that was based upon a pun. We were so good and getting a blue ribbon was the icing on the cake. Our Captain’s mother, Betty Lou Tolan was the founder of the contest in Cannon Beach in the early 60′s. The party to celebrate our achievement afterward was always the best time of the year. Ah… those were the days.
This contest in Long Beach awards cash to the winners. We got only ribbons at Cannon Beach and maybe a printed certificate. It didn’t matter. The intensity of taking on a project with sand and sea water and coming up with a fine sculpture was reward enough. SandSations is a great event here in Long Beach, Washington and it’s growing every year. You can experience the great hospitality at Boreas Inn, dine on our feast at breakfast time, walk our trail to the beach and watch the SandSations competition! So come to the beach for a long weekend, July 21-24!
Boreas Inn still has a couple of really beautiful rooms open for the 4th of July holiday weekend! Since the 4th is on a Monday, a few of our guests coming for the weekend are actually leaving right on the 4th–so we have a couple rooms open on the 4th proper in addition to the 1st and 2nd of July. This is NEXT weekend–wow! We are asking for a three-night minimum over the weekend, but as we approach the holiday, we will compromise on two-night stays, if we must, but three nights is so relaxing at Boreas!
We love the 4th of July in Long Beach, Washington. Well–sort of. It is clearly the most exciting day of the year on the gorgeous Long Beach Peninsula. We would love it more if all the people packed out what they pack in. (Our Boreas guests are always perfect–it’s the other 20,0000 guests on the Peninsula who aren’t so perfect!) The Long Beach Peninsula is truly a place for amateur and professional pyromaniacs!
To address this post-explosive and partying beach clean-up problem on the 4th of July on the Long Beach Peninsula, there are now “Treasure Our Beach” volunteers at all the beach approaches, handing out trash bags and fliers encouraging everyone who comes to the beach to picnic and blow things up, to take their trash home with them! We treasure our Treasure our Beach volunteers. Thank you all! If any of our readers would like to help in this effort, please let us know. Shelly Pollock’s Grass Roots Garbage Gang will have hundreds of volunteers combing the beaches on July 5th to pick up after the 4th of July revelers and we are grateful to those volunteers also! This is a big beach clean-up and we always need more volunteers!
Well first of all, on Saturday, the 2nd of July, to lead off the pyrotechnic displays, there is a stunning and sparkly professional fireworks show on the Port of Ilwaco over the harbor. We like to reserve tables for our guests at Pelicano on Saturday at the Port of Ilwaco, before the 4th so that they have front row seats for the Ilwaco Fireworks display. So in addition to wine pairings at Pelicano that evening, there are fireworks pairings also! If you have dinner at Pelicano, you will also have a place to park right on the harbor for the fireworks. It is truly inspiring to see the glittering on the water and this display just whets the appetite for the total pyrotechnic craziness that is the true 4th of July in Long Beach, WA. We’ve never seen anything quite like Long Beach on the 4th. So there is a method to our madness–we like our guests to dine on the best for breakfast and dinner and watch the celebration of our nation’s independence!
We brag about our 28-mile long beach. Well just about every foot of our very long beach will be filled with cars, families, picnics and We’d estimate–millions of dollars of fireworks that will blow your socks off. This doesn’t include the very fine professional show that happens at dark on the ocean-end of the Bolstad Beach approach five blocks south of Boreas Inn. It’s all FREE and quite insane. Stay on the boardwalk or sit in the back yard of Boreas Inn, (the hot tub has a great view) and stay a safe distance from all the pyromaniacs and you will have a great time in Long Beach, Washington on the 4th of July, 2011. I found a video taken by visitors to the Peninsula last year and you can get a little idea of what it’s like in front of Boreas Inn on the 4th. Hang onto your sparklers, baby!
Grab our last rooms and watch the 2nd and 4th of July shows at Boreas Bed and Breakfast Inn on the lovely Long Beach Peninsula!
Odell Hathaway, one of our most devoted friends and fans of Boreas Inn took this video of our brand new spa at dawn on the 3rd of September! So this is truly the Dawn of Boreas Inn’s New Hot Tub. Odell is so clever! The Space Odyssey music just fits!
Our Brand New Spa--Come Bubble Your Troubles Away!
The tub new spa is a bit smaller than our older one and very roomy for our “couples” only soaking. There are three seats, including two side-by-side recliners, 36 jets (!) and beautiful revolving underwater colors, if you like a little light. It’s hard to get a good picture of the new spa unless you dangled from the gazebo ceiling! The tub is made by Cal Spa’s division “OC Hot Tubs”. I thought Orange County motorcycles were gorgeous, but this spa is pretty lush! Bill and I tried it out on Thursday night and it was just perfect. The operations and materials are quite “green” and so far, our guests say they love the new spa. So in addition to fine regional cuisine, the most comfortable beds, and extra special whatever we can think of for our guests, we now have a new spa with a beautiful view. The ex-spa works fine–and we’re looking for a home for it. It sprung a leak around a seal (we think) but other than that, it works fine. So if one of our former guests would like it, we can arrange for that to happen. You will have to haul it away! It was very sad to see it leave the gazebo (and quite a project to get it out of there!)
This year’s Wild Mushroom Celebration is October 22th- October 24th. The cost includes a two-night weekend stay with our amazing breakfasts and A 3-course Wild Mushroom and Washington Wine Dinner at The Depot Restaurant.
Our Sunday morning breakfast will be our annual Wild Mushroom Breakfast featuring Veronica Williams, our professional forager, as guest hostess and discussion leader. We will add two extra courses onto the Sunday breakfast to make it even more decadent! As an add-on special, Veronica will take you foraging on Saturday for wild mushrooms for an additional $50 per person. The cost of the package is $550 per couple all inclusive. $595 for the Dunes Suite. Without the wine courses, the cost is $510 per couple all inclusive and $555 for the Dunes Suite.
The menu for The Depot Dinner is, as usual, wonderful. We haven’t selected the wine pairings yet…
Melange of Roasted Wild Mushrooms in a Cream Sauce on Crostini with Fresh Goat Cheese and Shave Pec0rino Romano Cheese
Sherried Chanterelle Mushroom Demi Glace on Wild Mushroom Risotto with Fresh Catch of the Day or 6 oz Filet Mignon
Triple Truffle Chocolate Brownie and Hazlenut Gelato Ice Cream Pie
The Goonies 25th Anniversary Celebration will take place across the River in Astoria from June 4-7, 2010. The Goonies was filmed locally in Astoria, OR and was originally released on June 7, 1985. But did you know that the Goonie’s director, Richard Donner, also directed Superman and The Lethal Weapon series and that it was a Steven Spielberg (E.T., Jaws, Schindler’s List) presentation? The Goonies screenplay was by Chris Columbus (Home Alone, Harry Potter series, Mrs. Doubtfire) from a story by Spielberg. Richard Donner produced the movie with Harvey Bernhard (The Lost Boys) and Spielberg executive produced with Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy (Indiana Jones series, Back to the Future, Curious Case of Benjamin Button). Clearly, The Goonies had a group of young geniuses masterminding a movie that has stood the test of time and is much beloved by fans around the world.
“In 1985 when The Goonies was filmed, we knew the movie would create a lasting impact in Astoria, and its legacy continues 25 years later,” stated Willis Van Dusen, Mayor of Astoria, Oregon. “This celebration is dedicated to the amazing Goonies fans and to the film itself, both of which have become an integral part of the cultural fabric of Astoria.” Well–that can’t be a bad thing, after all, The Goonies has given us pleasure, excitement and giggles for 25 years!
The Goonies is an adventure-comedy film set in Astoria about a group of kids from the “Goon Docks” neighborhood of Astoria (hence the nickname “Goonies) who band together hoping to save their homes from foreclosure and demolition due to the expansion of the Astoria Country Club. The group embarks on an adventure to find the buried treasure of a legendary 17th century pirate, One-Eyed Willy. The kids have an exciting time on their coastal antics featuring spooky caves, old lighthouses, treacherous traps, pirate maps and skeletons, clever script and much beloved characters– Mikey, Chunk, Data, Mouth (Corey Feldman), Brandon (Josh Brolin!) Rosalita and the rest of the nasty Fratelli’s. The ending of The Goonies is classic, perfect and predictable with the jewels from the pirate ship providing more than enough to save everyone’s homes from foreclosure and demolition. The story and its ending could also ring true for homeowners battling their individual crises during our nation’s current “Great Recession”! If only we could plunder a pirate ship and bail out everyone losing their homes–or better yet, bail out those of us running small businesses! Let’s all go search for treasure!
The Goonies 25th Anniversary Celebration has a schedule of events in Astoria and a very cool website. The Astoria-Warrenton Chamber, of which we are proud members, is partnering with Warner Brothers on the event who are assisting in marketing and licensing Goonies souvenirs, which will be sold at the “Goon Docks”, the center of all the Goonies Celebration events. Boreas has rooms available for the celebration weekend so you can be at the beach but be within a half- hour of all the events. Watch a video clip of The Goonies and come to Boreas for the Goonie’s celebration!
