The Fabulous Oregon Coast

The southern Oregon coast is underrated. It doesn't have many resorts like the shore farther north. Its beauty is not as famous as Big Sur; there's not much of a surfing culture like Southern California. But this is a spectacular stretch of shoreline, and its remoteness and solitude make it even better. This is a typical scene between Brookings and Gold Beach.

I stayed at a motel right on the ocean in Gold Beach, where I'd stayed a couple of times before. It was sunny up until just before sunset: then the fog rolled in fast. Actually, it just kind of developed, moving from south to north. Fog always makes for cool pix, if your timing is right; a few minutes after I took this shot, the scene was socked in.

I moved north today to Newport. Stayed in a Best Western that also has a fabulous view. The beach in front of the resort is normally windswept, and it's just a sea of dunes. This is accentuated late in the day when the lowering sun highlights the beachscape.

Sunset from my room, at the end of a superb, top down day cruisin' the Oregon coast.

Crusin' the North Coast

Haven't been blogging much lately, but I'm back on the road so will resume. Currently I'm ambling up the coast, dodging a fierce inland heat wave. Temps near the ocean are in the 60s and 70s, then it warms up about a degree for every 40 miles you go inland. 106 today in Portland, one degree off their alltime record!! The 107 was first hit on July 30, 1965; I was 13 and spent the day sitting in the sprinkler at home. Here, in the primeval forest at Humboldt Redwoods SP, the temperature was mild and the atmosphere was fabulous. I'm not religous in the traditional sense, but I do attend church from time to time. This day, in the towering old growth redwoods, I was in church. I'm also in church when I go to Crater Lake; Yosemite; Sequoia; the beach; and the Arizona desert in spring bloom.

Yesterday I took a hike in Redwood NP, along Prairie Creek. In addition to the big trees, the forest is a kaleidoscope of green. Ferns, sorrel, and other ground cover plants abound. The world of light and shadows is forever fascinating.

This pic is blurry if you blow it up...you really need a tripod in the deep woods to take good photos and I didn't have one. But I thought it was cool that the park folks had carved a bench into a quintessential nurse log, complete with masses of growing things all around the seat.