Monday June 26, 27.5mi/44.3km

Cape Perpetua Campground (190.1/140ft) to Florence town (217.0/20ft) (OR) +0.6mi trails to campground/hostel

I packed up from my campsite and hiked out at 7:30. There was a little mile-long trail that led back toward the beach, and it went through all these huge old spruce trees.

As I expected the beach was foggy, as it usually is in the early morning.

I hiked a nice trail for a couple miles that paralleled Highway 101, but high above it, so I didn’t know it was there.

Soon the trail ended and I had to walk on the highway for 6 miles. That wasn’t great, but at least it had some pretty good views.

This was a really fun row of houses to see, the beach towns up north always had colorful houses like this. As I’ve hiked further south, the houses have become more gray and boring.

More nice views from the roadwalk.

After a couple hours of roadwalking, I dropped down to the beach. There is no town near here so the beach was almost perfectly empty!

A couple miles ahead, I could see Haceta head in the distance, covered in clouds.

Slowly the clouds shifted away, and it seemed like it was going to be sunny by the time I got there.

I left the beach on this neat little path called The Hobbit Trail.

I climbed 500 ft up to the top of Haceta Head, where I had a good view back to the beach I had just hiked.

A few minutes further down the trail and I came to the Haceta Head Lighthouse, a very popular tourist attraction.

I went inside to look around, and didn’t get very far since they weren’t giving tours today.

It’s not a very tall Lighthouse but it was very well kept.

The view to the north from the lighthouse lookout point:

I walked on the tourist path to the parking lot and saw the Cape Creek Bridge, which I would soon be walking over.

The architectural style of the bridge was very unique, it looked like a double layer of bridge. I followed the access road up to the highway, where I crossed the bridge and soon came to a tunnel.

The tunnel was only 200 m long, but it was very narrow and a little scary to hike inside with the traffic. I pressed the button that makes the yellow lights flash to warn of bicyclists and pedestrians in the tunnel. Having got through that obstacle successfully, immediately after I hiked by the Sea Lion caves attraction.

In the summertime, the sea lions are not in the caves, but laying out on the rocks so I didn’t see the point in paying the admission fee. I continued on the road walk for 3 miles, frequently getting great views of the beaches ahead.

After the road walk was a blissful 6 miles of beach walking. It was pretty windy but since I’m walking with the direction of the wind so I didn’t care.

At the end of the beach was a jetty, marking the outlet of some inland river.

So I followed the jetty inland to a series of roads, which traveled along a beautiful little bay for a while.

Pretty soon I entered the town of Florence, which had a bunch of quirky little attractions.

And I believe Exploding Whale Park is a reference to the 1970 incident when the town tried to remove a dead whale with dynamite.

I ended my day at the Florence hostel, a cute little house just a block off the main strip of Florence.

The main rooms were very nice, and the kitchen seemed to have everything including a bunch of breakfast items!

I got settled into my room, went to the Safeway to buy some food, then made dinner showered, and did laundry. I spent the rest of my evening doing planning for the final week of this hike, and my travel to the next hike!

Sunday June 25, 30.8mi/49.6km

South Beach State Park Campground (159.3/33ft) to Cape Perpetua Campground (190.1/140ft) (OR)

I was awake early to begin a long day of hiking, most of it being easy miles on beaches. A few minutes into my day and I saw my first wildlife!

To leave the campground I had to hike over a few dunes. The soft sand is always slow going.

And then I was on the beach! There’s a ton of stuff that washes up from the ocean, most of it is dead crabs, jellyfish, and kelp. This object was none of those things, and it almost looked like a skeleton.

My second wildlife of the day was a seal, who was napping on a sandy spit.

The beach went on and on, under the morning’s cloudy skies. Usually the clouds burn off around mid morning.

In some of the rocky cliffs, there were little caves that had been formed by the erosive power of the sea.

At one point I came to a little stream crossing that was deep enough where I would have to take off my shoes to cross. There was also a bridge a couple hundred meters inland, so I detoured to the bridge.

After another hour of beach walking, I departed the beach at a minor headland.

I love these neat little trails, they’re so hidden in the brush that you can’t see them until you’re right in front of the entrance.

I arrived at the Alsea Bay bridge at lunchtime so I ate lunch in the little picnic area at the base of the bridge. I couldn’t figure out why the area had so many concrete obelisks.

The Alsea Bay Bridge was huge, it was about a half mile of walking to get to the other side.

On the other side, I was in the town of Waldport, “where the forest meets the sea”.

There were lots of little shops and restaurants, it was maybe six blocks long. Many of the buildings had amazing artwork painted on the side.

After I left town, the trail left the road and returned to the beach. I was seeing seals everywhere!

An hour later, I saw a very different type of ancient wildlife, a redwood stump. The stump was not washed here by the sea but instead grew in this spot, 1200 years ago. The climate must have been different then, because in modern times all of the redwoods grow much further south, over 200 miles away in California. Cool.

After a couple hours of beach hiking, I could see the end of this beach. The clouds had been accumulating all afternoon, but no rain happened.

I left the beach just north of the town of Yachats, on this very nice path called the 804 Trail.

It was now high tide, and the waves were crashing thunderously on the rocks.

Watching waves crash on rocks is so much more fun than watching them gently roll up on a sandy beach!

There was a state park with a little beach, which was more protected from the crashing waves.

I walked through the little town of Yachats, and since it was 5pm I decided to have dinner.

I ate at Luna Sea Fish House, of course ordering the fish and chips.

After spending an hour at the restaurant I continued my walk through town. It was a cold day so unsurprisingly the beach was empty.

There was a few minutes walking next to Highway 101 on a little path.

And pretty soon the trail turned into the forest, where there were a bunch of interpretive displays and artwork. Of course I had to get a photo next to the bear statue.

This section of trail is called Amanda’s Trail, named for an elderly blind woman of the Coos tribe, who was forcibly marched (along with the rest of the tribe) by the US government to a distant reservation, where many of them died of starvation and disease. There was a statue to memorialize her.

After spending some time exploring that sad spot, I crossed the nearby creek on a swingbridge.

I climbed 1,000 ft up Cape perpetua through an increasingly wet and green forest.

There was a nice viewpoint at the top.

Since I was so high I was up in the cloud!

I hiked back down the other side on switchbacks, and within a mile I was at the Cape Perpetua Campground. I talked to the campground host who told me that all the OCT hikers camp on site 29A, the hiker/biker site. That site was an extra half mile walk from the entrance, bummer. 10 minutes later I was at my campsite, and had my tent set up under a big spruce tree.

Since I had dinner in town just 2 hours before, I didn’t make my usual pasta dinner at camp. So with almost no camp chores to do, I was in bed at 9pm. Long day!

Saturday June 24, 2.2mi/3.5km

Newport Yaquina Bay Bridge (157.1/140ft) to South Beach State Park Campground (159.3/33ft) (OR)

I was awake at 5am, strangely it was already light out at that hour…. Being this far north during the longest days of the year makes for confusing sunrises.

I hiked an hour back to my car, and after organizing some gear I was on the road at 6:30. It was a 6-hour drive back to Portland, where I put my car back into storage and then took the subway to Union station. I had about 30 minutes before my Amtrak train left, so I caught up on emails.

The inside of the train was very nice, and I need to remember to travel by train again. It was a very spacious and easy experience.

Basically reversing the process from 3 days ago, I got off the train in Albany, and I took the same bus back to the coast at Newport. By now it was 7pm, so I hiked 30 minutes to the closest campground. First I had to hike over the Yaquina Bay bridge.

It was a very tall bridge so ships could pass underneath, in the view from the top of the bridge towards the sea was spectacular.

On the other side of the bridge I got distracted by the Rogue brewery. They make some famous and very delicious beers, so I stopped in for a pint!

From there I had 15 minutes of hiking to the South Beach State Park.

Once I was in the State Park, all the trails were paved and went through these dense coastal forests. Neat!

It was a huge Campground, but eventually I found the hiker/biker site, and setup my tent next to a few other human-powered adventurers. It was only 9pm but I was exhausted from a long day of travel, so I instantly fell asleep.

Thursday June 22 & Friday June 23, 0.0mi/0.0km

I was awake at 5:30am, and boarded the 6:15 bus to Corvallis, where I waited for a different bus to take me to Portland.

That second bus arrived at 8am, and by 10:30 I was reunited with my car in Portland. I stopped for lunch, and then drove 4 hours to Washington’s Olympic Coast. Since I would be car camping with my friend Randi for the next couple of nights, I stopped to get some food and snacks.

I arrived at Kalaloch Campground around 4pm, and even though both of us had been hiking all week (she had just summited Mt Rainier!), we decided to go for a short hike on the beach.

Pretty soon we came to the Tree of Life, a famous Sitka Spruce with its roots hanging in the air.

You could easily hike underneath it, and go inside of the cave that the roots made.

We hiked a little further enjoying the foggy beach.

Back at the campsite we exploded our vehicles onto the picnic table and had a feast for dinner, even including a salad! Both of us have been craving greens and vegetables, given our recent diet of backpacking foods.

And it was really fun having a campfire, which I almost never do on long hikes since it’s a lot of effort.

After dinner and some evening beverages, we returned to the nearby beach to watch the moon set.

The next morning we left our campsite and drove North up the coast to ShiShi Beach. Along the way we stopped in Forks, WA. According to a local resident, their economy is based on three things – Timber, Tourism, and Twilight. We did some tourism and checked out the Bigfoot museum and store.

I really wanted this bigfoot shirt but they didn’t have any size small…bummer.

Then we went across the street to the Twilight museum, which was dedicated to the series of vampire movies from the 2010s.

The movie franchise was really popular, and the two volunteer staff at the museum seem to know every little detail about the 5-movie series. They had a pretty good collection of props and costumes used in the movies, ha!

And of course at the end, we got our picture in front of the screen.

After grabbing lunch in Forks, we drove the rest the way to the coast. The parking for ShiShi beach is on Makah tribal land, so we basically parked in some guys front yard for a small fee.

From the parking area it was an easy 3 mile hike to the beach.

I love hiking through the dense temperate rainforest.

It was so green!

An hour later we arrived on the beach and set up camp. View to the north:

View to the South:

View of beer:

I wouldn’t usually camp on a beach, but this was a pretty sweet spot!

We had a few hours before dinner time so we took a walk to a rocky cliff area to check it out. There were tons of seabirds looking for food on the rocks.

Back at the campsite, we ate dinner and Randi started a campfire. (I don’t have the skill or patience).

Just before we went to bed, a group of hikers arrived at like 10pm. It was confusing to see a large group of headlamps wandering the beach looking for a campsite at that hour.

I fell asleep to the sound of the waves, tomorrow I will have to wake up early to make the trek back to the Oregon Coast Trail. It was a great two days on the Olympic Coast!

Wednesday June 21, 27.0mi/43.5km

Taft Beach (129.2/10ft) to Newport Yaquina Bay Bridge (157.1/140ft) (OR)

I left the motel pretty late at 10am, but fortunately the miles flew by quickly today. I hiked down Highway 101 for an hour and crossed over Drift Creek.

I was glad to leave the highway, and after cutting through a small neighborhood, I was on Gleneden Beach.

It wasn’t a very long beach, maybe only a couple of miles. Pretty soon I could see the headland that marked the end of the beach.

As usual, I exited up one of the official entry/exit points that are marked with these neon yellow signs.

I climbed up onto the headland, and even though it was very short, it still had a great view from the top.

The trail cut through the vegetation, which was so thick it made a kind of tunnel.

I emerged back on Highway 101, but this time I didn’t have to walk directly on the highway, since there was a trail right next to it underneath the power lines.

Occasionally the trail meandered away from the highway and went through some really neat looking mossy forests.

And then it returned to the highway. This section was pretty funny since it traveled directly behind the guiderail.

This amazing little spot was called Boiler Bay State scenic viewpoint.

Next I walked through Depoe Bay, which was the whale watching capital of the world.

The ocean is very deep here since the land drops off a cliff into the sea, and the whales can swim pretty close to shore.

Apparently it’s also the world’s smallest harbor!

There were tons of people walking around and window shopping in all the little buildings. It kinda reminded me of the village of Lake Placid, except it was next to an ocean. Normally I would stop for a snack or ice cream but I got a late start and needed to keep moving.

I hiked through the Rocky Creek State scenic area, which had some cool little coves that made semi-musical noises when the high tide waves struck them, kind of like a symphony. I hiked a couple miles uphill to the top of Cape Foulweather.

The visitor Center was closed, but there were still views to be had.

The spot was quite popular with tourists, so I was able to get somebody to take a photo of me.

It was pretty cold and windy up there, even on a nice sunny day. I could see how it earned the name Cape Foulweather. I hiked downhill for a couple miles back to sea level, and arrived at the Devil’s Punchbowl Park.

The punchbowl is a hollow rock formation, where the water churns violently at high tide. Since it was low tide, there was nothing to see. So I took the stairs down to the beach and enjoyed another beach walk.

I think this was called Beverly Beach.

And this one was Moolack Beach.

By now the tide was starting to come in, so I had to hike up on the road for a mile to get around a tight spot. But pretty soon I dropped down to the beach again. This one was called Agate Beach, and it was very popular with surfers.

It was also very windy and full of dunes.

I looked behind me to see Yaquina Head, and its namesake lighthouse.

By now it was 7pm so I walked quickly down Nye Beach for a couple miles, and then left the beach at another lighthouse. This one was called Yaquina Bay lighthouse.

I walked through the little park, and pretty soon I was in the city of Newport. I could see the Yaquina Bay Bridge, which I would be crossing the next day.

Since there is no place to camp near the city, I unfortunately had to get a motel room. I walked half a mile through the little city, pausing briefly at the little attractions.

I thought this sign was hilarious, since this is the western end of US Highway 20, and the eastern end is at Kenmore Square in Boston, near where I used to work.

I checked into my motel room, dropped off my stuff, and then walked down the street to get a quick meal since it was almost 9pm. I was in bed an hour later, with my alarm set for 5:30am. My plan is to take a couple days off the trail, and meet up with a friend who is visiting the Pacific coast in Washington. So I’m catching a 6:15am bus to make that happen!

Tuesday June 20, 15.0mi/24.1km

FS1861 on top of Cascade Head (114.2/1230ft) to Taft Beach (129.2/10ft) (OR)

This section of trail is in a very developed area, so there are few camping opportunities. After last night’s campsite, I would be stuck with motels for the next two nights. Knowing I had another short day, I didn’t leave camp until 9am. It had also rained all night and finally stopped at 8am, so I had no incentive to leave my tent early! The first 3.5 miles of today were on a brushy wet trail, aka a carwash.

The first half mile of trail started off ok…

… And the dense fog up here at this elevation made the forest feel really ancient and isolated.

I don’t know the name of these plants but they had massive leaves. My foot looks little by comparison!

The next hour of hiking was basically just thrashing through dense vegetation and getting soaked in the process. It took me an hour to hike just 2 miles and I was pretty scratched up afterwards. I kept my phone safe in a waterproof bag so there were no photos of that horrendous trail. After I had descended a thousand feet and arrived back to the highway, I was back in the warm sunshine. I took a break at the Salmon River interpretive area, which had picnic tables and bathrooms.

There was an amazing view over the Salmon River estuary, which was preserved over decades by the Forest Service, which bought up local land, and removed the dams & levees that were impairing the ecosystem.

The distance I could see Cascade Head, which I had camped on last night, and it still had its top in the clouds! I hiked onwards, and turned down a side road which would lead to the beach. Unfortunately some local posted a homemade sign to imply that the road was private property (people are jerks).

I even called and left a voicemail with the Lincoln County surveyor’s office, asking about the status of this road, since the sign didn’t look official and all other data sources suggest it’s a public road. Regardless, I walked Highway 101 to the beach to avoid any irate locals, and keep a good name for OCT hikers. Back on Highway 101, I hiked a couple miles to the beach. I passed this interesting sign along the way, halfway between the equator and the pole!

Finally I was back on the beach and away from the traffic of the highway.

I like that this beach had cool rock formations near the shore, which made the crashing waves really interesting to watch.

Looking behind me I could still see Cascade Head, and that it was still covered in clouds! Crazy.

I hiked for a couple hours on the nice beach, with no high tide issues like yesterday. When I got to Spanish Head, there was this really neat rocky part that I had to scramble through.

Pretty soon after that the beach sort of ended, and the outlet of Siletz bay became an obstacle. I turned inland along the bay, and got to watch some seals play in the water.

Usually leaving the beach is the hardest part, because you have to hike through a bunch of soft sand that tries to prevent any forward progress. But Taft Beach had this nice mat, which made it easy to walk.

With the lack of usefully-spaced camping options in this section, I was forced to spend the night in a motel again. At least it was a Tuesday night so I got a pretty good price.

And the view over Siletz Bay was amazing.

Usually the back of the hotel room door has a list of rules, the checkout time, etc. Around here they have the tsunami evacuation procedure!

I walked to the local IGA grocery store, and grabbed some items to reheat in the microwave for dinner. After watching some bad TV (including a couple episodes of Hot Wings, Orange is the New Black, and Lego Masters), I went to bed.

Monday June 19, 14.2mi/22.9km

Pacific City (100.0/23ft) to FS1861 on top of Cascade Head (114.2/1230ft) (OR)

The available camping is awkwardly spaced in this stretch, so I only had 14 miles to hike today. I checked out of the motel at 10am, and walked over to the coffee shop where I redeemed the motel’s free smoothie offer. I chose the pineapple and blackcurrant flavor, which was superb. I finally walked out of town at noon, and the first stretch was on a local road.

After walking for an hour on that road, I turned onto highway 101 South. It was a busy highway, but it also felt safer with the huge wide shoulders. I thought a few groups of bikepackers, one of them said they were writing from Vancouver to San Diego…cool!

It was a scenic roadwalk through some farm fields and dairyland.

After a couple hours of road walking I returned to the beach. As usual the parking lot for the beach access had a bunch of surfers’ cars covered in stickers. This one seemed especially fitting for me.

I always like the beachwalks, they’re easy, relaxing, and there’s no navigation or traffic to think about.

Though sometimes there is a high tide to worry about! The beach got pretty narrow here, and I had to scramble up onto the rocks after a poorly timed wave approached me.

As I neared the end of this section of beach, I saw Proposal Rock come into view.

To get around the next headland, I had to hike inland and go over it using roads and trails. The first road went by a little ice cream truck, which sadly was closed today.

So I had to settle for a pint of ice cream from the general store across the street. As I waited in line I also browsed their book collection.

From there, I was back on highway 101 for a couple miles before turning off into the Siuslaw National Forest.

I could see why this was called the Rainforest Trail, all the vegetation in this entire area was very dense and green.

A tiny part of the trail had been washed out by some winter storms, but it was easy to get around.

I hiked up the trail for an hour and arrived at the top of Cascade Head, and a forest service road. Since it was 6pm, and the next available camping was at least 10 miles away, I put up my tent in the middle of the closed road.

It was probably the only flat and clear spot around for miles, the only downside was the firm gravel underneath. The tent stakes were hard to get into the ground, but eventually I managed and only broke one of them. After I made dinner and got into the tent for the night, I could hear it starting to rain while I was reading my book. Bummer. Hopefully it will stop soon so I can pack up a dry tent in the morning!

Sunday June 18, 13.4mi/21.6km

Cape Lookout State Park (86.6/20ft) to Pacific City (100.0/23ft) (OR)

Because I started hiking at 4:45am, the beach was still pretty dark when I left the campground.

It had rained pretty hard overnight, and it looked like it was threatening to rain again, but it held off for most of the morning. I love the smell of a forest after a recent rainstorm.

The trail climbed up to a short headland and I had a pretty good view of the ocean from above.

In theory this trail was closed due to “storm damage” but I didn’t see any fallen trees and even the bridge looked brand new.

As I descended from the other side of the headland, I started to see the sunrise creep into the treetops. Cool!

I could see Cape Lookout as I descended the trail back down to the beach.

In some places the trail was a little overgrown, but mostly it was a very nicely maintained trail through a mature forest.

By 6am I was back down to the beach, and I had a quick 4 miles to walk to get to the crossing of Sand Lake outlet. The outlet can only be crossed at low tide, which today occurred at 7:30am, hence the super early starting time today.

The view behind me to Cape Lookout got better as the sun came up.

Usually the little sea critters will move when I walk down the beach, but this crab stayed still.

Then the clouds started to build and the sky got darker…

I could tell it was raining out over the ocean, when this rainbow appeared.

In some places the sand on the beach had a really cool texture, I think it must be shaped by the wind.

At 7:45am I arrived at Sand Lake outlet, and crossed it easily. At 15 minutes after low tide it was only knee deep.

I had another couple hours of hiking on the beach, and the sky ahead of me looked clear.

The sky behind me, however, looked very angry.

Pretty soon those clouds caught up to me, and it rained pretty hard for 30 minutes. Then the rain tapered off and I could see cape Kiwanda in the distance.

It was an easy climb over the short sandy headland, it was basically just a very tall sand dune.

I dropped down the other side, and it was full of surfers.

I had a mile of walking on the beach and I saw tons of surfers out despite the terrible weather. Or maybe the terrible weather makes the waves better? I’m not sure.

At 10am I turned off the beach and went into Pacific City, which is the route of the Oregon Coast Trail. I stopped into Meg’s cafe to have a third breakfast, which of course is the most important breakfast.

I was kinda hoping to run into a bigfoot in the bathroom.

While I was waiting for my food, I checked the weather forecast and the rest of today looked very wet and cold (55F/13C). And tonight looked the same. So I got a room at the local Anchorage motel.

They gave me a small discount since I was a hiker, which was very nice and definitely unexpected. The room was surprisingly fancy.

Even the bathroom had this fancy sink, kinda more like an old timey fountain.

I checked out what was on TV, and because it was Father’s Day, they were running an all-day Baywatch Marathon. Ha!

After I unpacked and showered, I left to do my grocery resupply, but on the way I stopped and got some ice cream of course.

Chester’s market was a half mile away but a pretty easy walk through some quiet neighborhoods. I bought 3 days’ worth of food to get me to the next big town of Newport, 60 miles away.

On the walk back I cut through a park and saw this funny sign. “cheese, trees, and ocean breeze”

Also apparently there is a small airstrip running right through the middle of the town of Pacific City!

It would be shocking to be walking along the sidewalk and see a small plane right above you, haha. I stopped at a little restaurant called Beach Wok, and ate probably the most delicious Pad Thai I’ve ever had. With all my chores done, I went back to my motel room and caught up on my internet stuff before falling asleep early, since I had been awake at 4am today.

Saturday June 17, 21.9mi/35.2km

Barview Jetty County Campground (66.4/15ft) to Cape Lookout State Park (86.6/20ft) (OR)

I left camp at my usual 7am starting time, and as soon as I left the state park I was walking on some railroad tracks.

The tracks parallel highway 101, which I will avoid walking as much as possible. I walked along Tillamook Bay and saw a lot of people getting clams(?) out of the sand, since it was low tide.

An hour later I was at the Port of Garibaldi, where I needed to arrange a boat ride across the bay to continue the trail.

I talked to a woman at the marina and she agreed to get her daughter to ferry me across in a small boat. They can only do it when the tide is coming in (not going out), and it was $50. While I waited, I was kept company by their dog Goosey, who was very interested in giving me her bone.

It was a very windy and cold boat ride, but it only lasted 5 minutes, and was the easiest mile I have traveled yet on this trail.

Now back on land, I walked along the other side of Tillamook Bay for an hour.

At one point the trail left the bay, and crossed the narrow strip of land I was on….

…. To emerge thru the dunes and at the beach on the other side of this narrow strip.

After a relaxing couple miles on the beach, it ended at a headland so I walked inland through a small village.

I turned onto a road up to Cape Meares, and there was no traffic since the road was temporarily closed for a landslide. It was a relaxing walk through a very tall forest.

After a couple miles I was in the main area for Cape Meares, and I started seeing more people, since there is another access road from the other side.

After crossing the parking lot, the first thing I saw was the largest Sitka Spruce in Oregon!

It’s 800 years old and 144 ft tall, dang.

I put my backpack next to it for a size reference.

I continued down the path and rejoined the road that leads to the lighthouse. There were viewpoints looking north:

And to the south:

At the end of the peninsula was Oregon’s shortest lighthouse, the Tillamook lighthouse is only 38 feet tall.

It sits on top of a 200 ft cliff so it doesn’t need to be that tall. Even from the lower viewing platform it didn’t seem very tall!

I tried to get a look at the inside, but you had to make a paid reservation for a tour. Oh well.

I walked back toward the parking area and found myself a picnic table to eat lunch at.

It was next to this cool welcome sign that I had missed on the way in.

After lunch I continued South, and just before I left the park there was one last attraction, the octopus tree.

It’s a bizarre looking tree that has no central/main trunk, but instead has eight separate trunks. Wild!

I continued on a short trail through the forest and then had an hour of roadwalking before I arrived back on the beach again.

The beach seemed pretty empty and I hardly saw any people or footprints. I saw a couple cool tiny little waterfalls though.

And then I came around a corner, and I saw heaps of people. An entire wedding party, in fact.

It’s one of those wedding spots that would be beautiful in photos but everything else about it would suck – it was windy, there was sand blowing everywhere, and it smelled like low tide. Pretty soon the beach ended and I came to another marina. Theoretically it’s possible to get a boat shuttle across this bay as well, but I didn’t see anyone around except these two scuba divers in the water.

So I did the roadwalk around the bay, which was about the same distance and was a scenic walk.

Two hours later and I had arrived at Cape Lookout State Park.

I registered at the entrance booth, and then walked to the hiker/biker site, which was in a beautiful secluded corner of the campground.

Just like before, there were nice food storage lockers to keep my stuff safe from the critters. And a short 100m walk led to this amazing little viewpoint over the beach.

It was my favorite campsite on this trail so far! I went to bed early, since I have to start hiking at 5am tomorrow in order to make it through a spot that requires low tide.

Friday June 16, 21.9mi/35.2km

Above Short Sand Beach (45.1/120ft) to Barview Jetty County Campground (66.4/15ft) (OR) + 0.6mi Manzanita lunch stop

I packed up and left my improvised camp spot, which was surprisingly comfortable. In a few minutes I was at Short Sand beach.

It was only 7:30 and already there were a bunch of surfers out enjoying the waves. I sat at one of the many picnic tables and enjoyed my breakfast. Afterwards, I hiked out of the picnic area only to find that the bridge had been destroyed by a fallen tree.

The stream was almost dry, so it was simple to rock hop across and continue on. I began the long slow climb up to the top of Neahkahnie Mountain. The trail switchbacked up the hillside and went right underneath this big tree!

After a little ways I entered a meadow with great views back towards the ocean.

After crossing highway 101 there was a small trailhead.

The trail climbed over 1,000 feet/300m up through a mature forest to the top of a ridge.

At one of the many switchbacks there was this confusing sign. It didn’t say what the danger was, so I was rather curious.

An hour later I was at the top of the mountain with a great view down to the town of Manzanita and the beach.

I had a snack break up top but it was a little chilly so I didn’t stay long. As soon as I crossed over this ridge it was a little windy too.

The downhill went quickly and pretty soon I was back down in greener terrain.

These vertical purple flowers were surprisingly abundant.

There were even a few of these thin little snakes! They were pretty short, only 12 inches/30cm.

After an hour of descending, I crossed back over Highway 101 and headed to the coast.

I walked through a neighborhood to get to the beach, and they had this funny sign.

The beach walk was windy, so thankfully I was only on it for a mile before I turned off into the town of Manzanita.

Time to grab some lunch! There were several burrito places.

Fortunately I chose the burrito place where you could get it smothered with red and green chile sauce.

It’s pretty rare to see that option outside of the Four corners States, so I was pretty excited. I made a quick stop to the grocery store for some ice cream and snacks.

And then I walked a couple blocks back to the beach. It was still windy and now it was foggy too.

I always walk on the hard packed sand since that is much easier to hike on, and I noticed there were signs that prohibited people from walking on the soft sand where birds were nesting.

An hour later I was at Nehalem Bay, and the only way across was to get a boat ride. I called the marina which was only a few hundred yards away across the channel.

While I was waiting for them to come pick me up I noticed someone had lined up a lot of crabs on the beach.

And these seals were in the water playing!

The guy from the marina came and got me 10 minutes later, and I threw my backpack in the fishing boat.

The marina also had a seafood business, so of course I had to try a Dungeness crab.

I had intended this to be a quick stop, but cracking into a crab is slow work so I was there for almost an hour. I finally left the marina at 5pm and hiked along the jetty back to the beach.

The beach walk was very nice and the wind had finally stopped. I passed by this cool formation called Twin Rocks.

As usual, there were a few people out walking on the beach. Two women were walking in my direction and joined me for 20 minutes of conversation. They were training for the “Hood to Coast” race in 2 months, a popular annual relay race in Portland. They were fun to talk to and the time flew by. Pretty soon I was at the end of the beach.

I exited the beach and walked into Barview Jetty County campground. It was a huge Campground, mostly full of RVs, so it took me awhile to find the hiker/biker site. I had to walk all the way out to the entrance station to get a map and a permit, and then walk a half mile back to the campsite. Clearly this place was designed by somebody with a car! I setup in my nice little camp spot and had dinner at a picnic table, it felt so civilized.

Another day on the Oregon coast!