We headed to Yachats on the coast and paid way more for the bed and breakfast than we normally would.
The view from the room:
After poking around at the rocks on the beach our first evening, we headed into town for dinner. One of the reasons we like Yachats is that they have a great restaurant with organic, healthy food scattered about a menu that includes fried food. Yum.
Breakfast at the B&B was also fantastic, with a bunch of fresh fruit and ramekins of scrambled and baked eggs. Oh, and good coffee is always a winner. We stuffed ourselves and went out for a hike on the St Perpetua trail in the Suislaw National Forest at Cape Perpetua.
We hiked in and out of fog until we made it to the top of the hill (mountain, cape, bluff, promontory?). Then the sun burned through and we could see from where we started the hike.
Can you see the little visitor's center there in the bottom left? It was a good hike. I'd love to say it was great to break out of little kid pace and really hit my own stride, but last summer Wrigley really did better on the Black Butte hike than I did. At least I never complained or asked Ed to tell me a story.
At the top of the trail is a CCC shelter. If I remember what the sign said correctly, 5 men brought all the stones up and built over several winter months. Yikes! The lead guy on the project said it wasn't hard, it just took patience.
Before we left, Wrigley made hugs for us to take with. They went on our hike and to lunch (which was also in Yachats, at a place less organic, but still very yummy).
After lunch we hit the coastal areas of Cape Perpetua. We've been here before with Wrigley (who was a wee toddler, but already discovered that she loved clambering over rocks). The waves here crash against basalt rock and create caves and caves whose roofs fall in and become wild inlets with names like Devils Churn and Spouting Horn. The hiking trail is called Restless Waters.
Two more views of the coastal capes. One from the top,
and one from the bottom
We had dinner in Florence, the next town south of Yachats, at yet another fantastic restaurant, one highly recommended by the B&B hostess. The drive was a bit harrowing, managing the Highway 101 curves in some pretty good fog. We drove past and saw the light of the Heceta Head Lighthouse. We're planning a yurting trip near there in a couple of weeks, so we'll get to explore that with Wrigley (we also decided to go back to Cape Perpetua then to see a Giant Sitka Spruce and Devil's Churn with her. The Sitka is 15 feet in diameter!).
Sunday morning was eggs benedict with smoked salmon, and I read in those adirondack chairs while Ed wrote. Since we were visiting the Oregon Coast and it was winter, Ed and I had planned on being stuck indoors - playing games, working, reading and watching stormy seas. We didn't get much of a chance to do those things this time around. The weather on Sunday was warmer and nicer than it had been on either of our two coast trips this August!
After a slow morning getting going, we headed back to Portland, planning to hike on a trail a few miles inland. After driving 7 miles up a one lane forest road, we discovered that the second forest road we were to take was closed. By the looks of things it had been closed for a while.
The actual trailhead was to start a mile and a half away. We explored a little ways down the one-time road, and then decided we didn't want to spend a mile and a half each way on this pseudo trail.
After half an hour we hopped back in the car and headed the long 7 miles back down the forest road. The hiking book we found this hike in was over ten years old. We've decided to retire it.
At the bottom of the hill and after the forest service road (did I mention that the road was partially paved, but mostly gravel), we started to hear a Funny Noise coming from the wheel well. Can't be good if I'm capitalizing it. We pulled over to the side of the road and examined all around the tires. I hate when my car makes Funny Noises. Especially when there is no Big Stick to explain it. We were hoping to clear away something, but no luck. We drove on and then, luckily after driving fast enough, the Noise stopped. Hooray.
Not so fast....
Another 50 miles along and the Funny Noise became a Big Screeching Scraping Noise that seemed to get worse when I turned the wheel. We had just passed up lunch in itty bitty town number 8 with it's a not-fantastic restaurant, and we were about 15 miles out of the next town which might have two not-fantastic restaurants and a closed on Sunday auto shop.
Really, it has been so long since I had any car trouble, I barely know what to do. Well, we wandered about town (tire squealing all the way) and happened upon an Napa Auto Parts that was open and that had an employee-who-knows-a-guy. The Guy works in his shop 7 days a week even though he isn't open 7 days a week, and surely he'd take a look at our Big Screeching Scraping Noise. Sure enough, the Guy jacked up our front end, took off the tire, banged around a bit and eventually knocked loose a well polished pebble that looked suspiciously like Forest Service road "paving" gravel. All with the assistance of one 4.5 year old helper. We took the pebble home and put into a jar where hopefully it will never have any other troublesome friends.
Whew! Back on the road again we had a decidedly not-fantastic fast food lunch at 3 o'clock, waded through some good heavy traffic (oh that's right, it's Thanksgiving day weekend), and were home finally at 5, 6 hours after leaving the coast.
Back at home we got the report. Wrigley is tired of Mac and Cheese and Marble was not pleased with our having left. She threw up about 5 times and didn't use the litter box at least once. Not a very friendly hostess, to say the least.
1 comment:
Now THAT was a week-end getaway to remember! Homecoming sounds pretty memorable also. And you've got it all in pictures to remember the pounding waves and the salt spray. I can just hear it and smell it from the pics.
Thanks for sharing. Mom
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