Down the Oregon Coast - September 12-30, 2006

We’ve spent the last few weeks exploring the glorious Pacific Coast. We started out in Washington on the Long Beach Peninsula, across the Columbia River from Astoria, Oregon. From there we moved on to Lincoln City, Florence and Gold Beach on the Oregon Coast. Of course, this took us through the heart of one of the most scenic areas of the country - like the photo on the left. Here’s a rundown on some of the highlights.

Long Beach claims to have the longest beach in the world (hence the name!) – over 20 miles of flat, dark sand. We drove the Durango for miles watching the gulls, sandpipers and kite flyers. We bought kites and tried to fly them, but we picked an afternoon with gale force winds. But there was another guy out there though who was buzzing his six-foot kite around like an angry hummingbird.

We visited a couple of spots on the route of the Lewis and Clark Expedition – a monument marking where Clark traveled up the Washington coast, the beach where they first saw the Pacific Ocean, and a spot on the Columbia River called Dismal Nitch (I love that name!) where the party was trapped for several days by a violent storm. It’s amazing to realize that was only 200 years ago – time flies when you’re transforming a continent!

The scenery changed as we moved down the Oregon Coast – lots of rugged headlands, pounding surf, and rocky outcroppings – a different, spectacular view around every bend. Just south of Lincoln City was a little bay formed where three streams flowed into the ocean. We had fun here watching the crabbers throw their traps into the water and pulling them out a few minutes later filled (hopefully) with crab. The bay was also home to a colony of harbor seals. We watched them feeding at the mouth of the bay until late afternoon when about 25 seals hauled out onto the far beach to relax on the sand.

They have a different attitude toward sea mammals in Gold Beach where the Rogue River meets the sea. The salmon were running and there were dozens of fishing boats trolling the mouth of the river. We spotted several seals and sea lions in the area, as well as a small boat labeled Sea Lion Patrol. Apparently the sea lions have become especially aggressive recently, often stealing the salmon right off the fishing lines. We watched the Sea Lion Patrol chase the sea lions out of the bay by throwing M-80 firecrackers behind them! We were assured that the animals weren’t hurt, and it did seem they weren’t too discouraged because they returned quickly. Frankly, I was rooting for the sea lions!

Gold Beach is also where we did our first whale watching. A couple we met clued us in that several gray whales had been hanging out at a spot just off the coast. We spent a half hour watching them spouting, blowing and flashing their tales as they sounded. Pretty cool! We’re looking forward to doing more of this as we travel south.

On a drive north from Lincoln City we came to a location where hang gliders sail from the top of a cliff to the beach below. An instructor was coaching some beginners and asked if I could take some photos and email them to him. Who knows? I may have my first photo credits in an upcoming issue of Oregon Hang Gliding Magazine.






Not that there haven’t been lots of other great photo opportunities! We stopped to check out a few of the famous lighthouses along the coast.
















Another day we drove east from Florence and saw some glorious fall colors on our way to discover some of Oregon’s remaining covered bridges.

We’re looking forward to continuing our journey down the coast. Next stop – northern California. Come back soon. .