Waldport, OR

Today seemed rather unproductive but was fun. I guess since I’m retired that it doesn’t matter that I have those days from time to time.

My wandering took me south along Highway 101 this morning, starting out with partial cloud as you’ll see from the pictures. A little way down the coast is the small town of Yachats, which is primarily a tourist town with cute shops and eateries. After poking around there, I continued down the coast to the Perpetua Scenic Area.

There were more beautiful wide beaches along the way, but the area gets quite rocky and rugged in the Perpetua area as you’ll see from the pictures of Cook’s Chasm and Devil’s Churn. It was relatively calm today so the surf wasn’t that impressive, but you always have a sense of how much more powerful it could be at times. In addition to Kodak moments there are a pile of paths and trails, some that are asphalt and some more rugged in the Perpetual area along with picnic areas, and campgrounds. I spent quite a lot of time hiking around the area.

Just a hint for anyone coming this way, the most popular of the State Parks (Cape Perpetual, Yaquina Head area and others) have “day use fees” which are not expensive ($5 or $7) but they add up. At this time of year they don’t have anyone there collecting them so you have to use the honour system and put the cash (or cheque! – does anyone still use those?) in a little envelope, fill out a form and put the stub on the dash of your car, which is a bit of a hassle. What I discovered today is that you can buy a vehicle passport that the Oregon Parks department sells. You can get either an annual pass for $35 or a 5-day pass for $10. Google “Oregon Pacific Coast Passport” to get more info. Makes good sense.

Just a short while down the winding road was Hecata Head Lighthouse State Park. (yes another $5 fee). The lighthouse is a bit of a walk (yes, mostly up) from the parking lot, but it is well worth the trip. The lighthouse is 56 feet high and it sits on an area at 205 feet above sea level that they dug into the headland to make it the correct height for ships to see the light 21 miles out. They have volunteers giving tours of the lighthouse, which has been restored in recent years, and I learned more today about lighthouses than I’ve ever known. I was glad to have the diversion to wait for the sun to break through the clouds to enable me to get better pictures of the lighthouse. Our volunteer was ex-navy and he told us about lighthouse, the use of the lighthouse by the navy during the second world war, and the restoration work that had been done.

One of the unique things about this lighthouse is that because they dug the building site out of the side of the headland, you can actually get above the lighthouse by taking a path up the side of the hill. (yes more climbing).

The light keeper’s house is now a popular B&B.

There hasn’t been too much construction along the way, but after leaving the Hecata Head Lighthouse area, I ran into a couple of areas where we were stopped for up to 15 minutes to be piloted through the construction. They are working on the rock barriers along the winding roads which were build in the 1930s. Unfortunately one of the areas that was inaccessible due to the construction was the area where all the iconic pictures of the Hecata lighthouse across the bay are taken.

Further along where the landscape starts to change into the sand dunes that are the prominent feature for the next 40 miles is the town of Florence, built at the mouth of the Siuslaw River. I tootled around Florence for a while and grabbed some more seafood chowder at a place literally right on the river called Mo’s which is a local small restaurant chain.

Florence was my turnaround point for the day with my intention being to visit the Sea Lion Caves just north of town on my way back to Waldport. Turns out that I was welcome to visit the cave, which I had already done years ago, for a reduced cost and a rain cheque to be used within the year, but I was told that the sea lions are not in residence at the moment! They are still out fattening up for the winter after the breeding season and won’t return to the cave until the end of November. So I headed back home for a nap before dinner.

I headed into Newport for one final look around and a casual dinner before heading back to write this blog and hit the sack.

Florence, OR

Yachats, OR

Waldport, OR

Waldport, OR

Today was drama-free, aside from the spectacular dramatic sights along my journey. I got up, packed up, drove to the next designated stopping spot, set up, spent the afternoon sightseeing and am now tucked into my little home for the night. This is a good thing.

From now on I am not going to pay any attention at all to the forecast because today was supposed to be cloudy all day, and it was absolutely beautiful; sunny and up to about 18 degrees.
On Saturday when I went to the cheese factory, I traversed the first part of today’s travels and today I carried on further south. There really are no words to describe the beauty of this coast. At one of my stops today, I had a chat with Pat and Harry from Indiana, and we talked about all the different kinds of beauty, and this coast definitely fits one of those notions. They too said I was brave to be doing this trip by myself. I know when people say that out loud that in their head they are substituting “crazy” for “brave”.

As I said, I set up camp early this afternoon at this most adorable campsite at the mouth of the Alsea River just over the bridge from Waldport. I then back tracked to visit some of the spots that I had seen along the way in a hurry since it was sunny and one never knows how long that might be.

I stopped at Seal Rocks and took some pics, and talked to a young man who was cycling along the Oregon Coast Cycle Route. I asked him what advice he’d have for my friends who would be doing some bicycling along the coast next year and he had two pieces of advice. Don’t leave it till October, do it in September when it’s not so crowded as summer and you have a better chance of good weather and take your time and enjoy it. Good advice I thought. So there you go Brenda.

Depoe Bay was my turn-around point and I stopped at the Chowder Bowl just across the main street from one of the most spectacular views, for a cup of clam chowder and salad and plotted my stops for this afternoon. The chowder was excellent and the soup, salad and garlic toast plus my usual diet coke was all under $15, U.S. of course. Seems like just yesterday I was sitting on the east coast of Canada doing the same thing. It was Cape Breton at the beginning of June, 4 and 1/2 months ago. Hard to believe.

Defoe Bay claims to have the world’s smallest navigable harbour, which is where the whale watching boats are tied up. There is a resident pod of grey whales that I managed to see some evidence of this afternoon, having seen several spouts in a matter of just a few minutes when one of the locals pointed them out to me. And the fishing scene from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” was filmed here. There is a really small channel into the harbour and although it was rough enough to shut down the whale watching tours, the water was like glass in the harbour.

Next it was along the Otter Crest Loop, a must do for bicyclists, and a stop at Cape Foulweather (named by Captain James Cook during his 1778 voyage) to see the Devil’s Punch Bowl, and as it turns out hundreds of resident pelicans. The Devil’s Punch Bowl is a sandstone formation that waves slosh in and out of creating quite the spray when it is high tide and the waves are high. Unfortunately neither was the case today.

Further down the coast, at Newport, I visited Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area and shot pics of the Lighthouse there as well as the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse which was just a mile or so further south.

I did a quick loop down to Nye Beach (where the sunset pic is taken) and Historic Newport Bay, but it was getting dark so I headed home after a fabulous day on the road.

Newport, OR

Otter Rock, OR

Depoe Bay, OR

Lincoln City, OR

Warrenton, OR

The Oregon Coast. It’s beautiful. Rugged and moody. Warm and fun. Paradise for photographers, hikers and shoppers alike.

I started the day back in Astoria, poking around the town a bit on my way to and from the Astoria Column. The Column stands at the top of Coxcomb Hill on the highest peak in Astoria. It was built in 1926 with financing from the Great Northern Railway and one of the famed Astor family. It stands 125 feet high, and I climbed to the top observation deck, all 164 steps. Unfortunately the clouds were still quite thick so not great for picture taking, but it was worth the epic effort to see the panorama from the observation deck. The murals on the column depict all sorts of history, including the tales of Lewis and Clark as this was the north-western terminus of their their Expedition in November of 1805.

Next I headed south on Highway 101, called the Pacific Coast Scenic Byway, not surprisingly, along the Pacific coast. By this time the sun had come out and it had warmed to 18 or so degrees, so I stopped when I arrived at Cannon Beach to stroll along the beach and get some photos of Haystack Rock without which no trip to the Oregon coast would be complete. I walked on the beach for almost 2 hours, enjoying the sun and sound of the surf. The beach of beautiful fine sand is really wide, and the water shallow, depending on the tides. It goes for miles with smaller versions of Haystack Rock poking up from time to time along the coast.

I had worked up an appetite so I picked up a deli sandwich and ate it sitting on a porch along the main drag, people watching. Cannon Beach has more art galleries than almost any town I’ve been in, I think. And the shops are definitely upscale, unique and interesting. Traffic and parking in late October were crazy, although it was a warm Saturday and it’s only an hour and a half drive from Portland. Can’t imagine what it’s like in the summer. The accommodation here was also high quality from private beach houses to B&Bs, to small hotels all running along the cliff overlooking the beach.

Revived by the rest and sandwich, I headed further south along the coast. The drive alternated between magnificent cliff views of the Pacific and heavily forested winding roads. Intersperced are cute towns all trying to compete for the almighty tourist buck and supporting the local fishing industry. Oysters appear to be a favourite, but since I’m not a fan I didn’t investigate. A particularly nice stretch was between Cannon Beach, through Oswald West State Park and down to Neakahnie-Manzanita State Park. Sometimes at sea level and then climbing through forest to 200 feet to poke out again to look down along the coast. There are multiple hiking trails along the way, and lots of pull outs to stop and admire the view. And beaches…….unbelievable beaches.

My stop in Tillamook was to visit the Tillamook Cheese Factory, just north of, you guessed it, Tillamook. Several people had mentioned it was an interesting stop and so I had to investigate. Having tours of production facilities is an excellent marketing tool. Adding some second floor windows to the plant and a cheese tasting line where I was able to consume maybe 1 ounce of cheese, resulted in US$ 39 in sales to me alone, not to mention the ice cream cone. (Which, BTW, Nanci was delicious!).

I turned around and headed north again, not without a couple of stops along the way to admire the views again in different light. I’m tucked back in my Prolite and unfortunately the rain has started and so I’m happy to be cocooning this evening.