2016 Coast Tour - Part 4
OK, here's the last one for this trip. We decided to go to Tillamook for the night and then head back over the coastal range to I-5 at Portlandia and back to home. Before leaving Reedsport we ate breakfast at Leona's cafe. It's a bit hidden back by the Safeway store. Another local spot with good food, service and reasonable prices.
We stopped at Cape Perpetua and got in our walking for the day. I heartily recommend taking the time to do this, especially if you're on a low tide. Traveling at this time of the year meant that there was less traffic since schools had begun after Labor Day and the beaches and lighthouses were definitely less crowded. That's why the MacKerricher Marine reserve north of Fort Bragg, CA was not charging for day use.
Cape Perpetua is one of the few accessible beach areas along this stretch of coast. Most of this coast line has the mountains running right to the ocean. Kind of like the Amalfi coast, and is not a bad simile for reference.
There are a couple named rock formations down on the water. Thor's Well and the Spouting Horn. These are eroded holes in the rock where wave action causes some real interesting natural occurrences. Thor's Well is about 30' in diameter and is around 20' deep. It's like a shoreside cave that had the top fall in. Incoming waves well up through the hole in a beautiful display of the ocean's power. It's not a place you would want to get too close to when the tide's high and the wind is strong, like when we were there. The surf was blowing up over the rocky shore as well as coming up out of the well.
Just to the south of Thor's Well there is one of the rock inlets along this section of coast. The surf come into the narrow defile and slams into the end with immense force. There's a short inlet on the side of the defile. The surf wells up through a small outlet and spouts like a whale.
I'm not sure when we'll get back to Cape Perpetua. I would like it to be when the tide times are in our favor so we can explore the tide pools down there. There must be a good 1/4 to 1/2 mile of rocky beach area to explore. But, you need to have low tide and a lot lighter surf conditions.
We swung off 101 several miles south of Tillamook to catch the last lighthouse on the Oregon coast that we hadn't been to yet, Cape Meares. It's the shortest lighthouse, using the Cape's elevation to get it high enough to see out on the Pacific. There's also an interesting pine tree there called the Octopus Tree. There's not 8 legs (actually secondary trunks) anymore, if there were originally. It's between the parking lot and the lighthouse.
That night we stayed in Tillamook. The least expensive alternative was the Shilo Inn on the north side of town. The place was what you'd expect from Shilo. Overpriced for the location. I can't understand how Tillamook can ask those kind of prices. There's not much there except the cheese factory. And, when it came time to catch dinner there was nada for quality and hours. The town appears to roll up the sidewalks at 7:30. We had to eat at the motel restaurant and lounge, which closes at 10. All other places shut down by 8 PM so plan on eating early.
Not much of interest to report from the drive back to Seattle. Portland traffic, even near noon, is tough but at least it's not like rush hour. I think the Portlandia traffic may even be worse than Seattle's. We spent over 2 hours on our Burning Bridges tour trying to get from the east side to the south end for dinner w/ Leah on a Wednesday night. We could not use the 205 bypass which is the ONLY way to get through Portland anymore unless your'e unlucky enough to have to go through town.
This will be it for travel blogging until we head off to Sicily in November. I may be posting some things regarding our national elections before then.
Ciao for now.