This morning, I woke up at approximately 7 AM at the “Chinook Winds Resort and Casino” RV parking lot. It was convenient to be able to take advantage of the casino’s WIFI, restaurant and complimentary coffee until 3AM. Afterwards, it was also nice to stay in the casino’s overnight RV parking lot.
Heading south, the first stop of the day was Yaquina Head State Park. The park contained many tide pools, including the Cobble Beach Tide Pools. Down by the tide pools, I chatted with a ranger who told me a bit about the marine life in the tide pools. She also offered numerous suggestions for the rest of the day, including Hobbit Beach Trail which I hiked later in the afternoon. It was a great time walking on the rock formations and watching the tides surging through the rock formations. The sound, sight, smell, and touch of the mist made this very entertaining to just sit and watch. Each wave interacted with the rocks differently, creating a new sight with each and every wave.
Continuing southward, I drove about two miles off Highway 101 to the Whispering Spruce/St Perpetua Trailhead. I remember briefly stopping at this trailhead with Elena and Costa a couple years ago. At the time, we hiked the Whispering Spruce Trail. Today, I hiked the St Perpetua Trail (2.2 miles round trip) which descended to the visitors center. From the visitors center, I hiked both the Cape Cove Trail (.3 miles) and the Captain Cook Trail (1 mile), which provided access and views to all of the tide pools along the coast. The tide pools at Cape Perpetua were much more active than the tidepools at Yaquina Beach State Park. It was another interesting experience, which was probably made even better by the low expectations I had when beginning the hike.
Continuing south about 30 minutes, I noticed the dirt parking lot off the highway, which Ranger Holbrook was telling me about this morning. The trail was only 1 mile round trip and ended at a quiet beach. The trees were covered in brown moss, with thin trunks, and thin, leafless branches. This led to the forest having a spooky, sci-fi-like environment. Thus, it was immediately evident why the trail was named the “Hobbit Trail.”
The last stop of the day was the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area. At the parking lot, there was a trailhead for the Oregon Dunes Trail, a 4.5 mile loop trail through the sparsely vegetated sand dunes. After about .5 miles on the trail, the trail turned into sand dunes and I decided to take off my shoes and continue the hike barefoot. A quarter of a mile later, there was a sign specifying that the beach was about .5 miles straight ahead. At the time, I hadn’t reviewed the map carefully enough to understand that this was part of the trail. Rather, I thought that this was an out-and-back detour from the main loop trail.
After retracing my steps another half mile back to the junction, I continued on the main loop trail until passing by the river and eventually reaching the other beach access point on the trail. When I reached the beach for a second time, I was frustrated and thought that the trail was very poorly marked. However, by now looking at the map and having patience, I realized that the loop trail consists of about 1 mile walking on the beach. The two beach points that I accessed at different times during the hike, were connected by a mile long portion of the loop trail which I didn’t know existed along the beach. Instead, I basically completed out-and-back hikes to both beaches, thereby completing about six miles of mostly-barefoot hiking on loose sand. It was scenic and the memory of the experience will be a positive one.
Tonight, I’m spending the night in Coos Bay, maybe spending a couple hours at a casino if I’m up for it.
