Beachside State Park

Although beaches most often do not have paths or "official" trails, hiking along the beach is one of our favorite activities.  If you enjoy that too, then maybe you should check out Beachside State Park. 

Located between Yachats and Waldport on the Oregon Coast, Beachside State Park, (or Beachside State Recreation Site as noted on the Oregon State Park website) as the name implies, is right next to the beach. We stayed in one of the two yurts in the campground, but there is a row of campsites for tent or rv's that provide campers with views of the beach and sunset without leaving your site.

Our yurt at Beachside State Park

Amazing sunsets along the beach!

From what we read, this campground is so close to the beach that it is closed during certain months due to winter storms and spring rains which often cause flooding in the campground.  When high tide arrived each evening on our trip, it provided us with the sound of ocean waves as we fell asleep.

Panoramic view of the beach and surf at dusk.

The beach area is one of the widest we've been to on our various camping trips and is wonderful for walking, kite flying, building sand castles, or just relaxing and soaking in the sun and sounds of the surf.  We even saw folks going out each day and surfing.  We tooks hikes along the beach at least once a day and found a few shells or treasure washed up on shore. Katie highly recommends the beach  for dogs too as she loved rolling in the sand, digging holes and running through the water.

One of many easy and quickly reached access trails to the beach.

Carol enjoying the beach on one of our walks along the coast.

Katie highly recommends the beach for dogs too!!

Other activities in the area include the Cape Perpetua Scenic Area which is located just 7 miles south of the Beachside SP which has various hiking trails, a visitor center and multiple coastal viewpoints.  We highly recommend you visit that area as well as the town of Yachats, just 5 miles south of Beachside SP.  If you love coffee, tea and great baked goods, be sure to stop by the Green Salmon Coffee shop in Yachats.  Parking spots may be hard to find, but the visit is worth the effort.  We stopped by twice during our three day vacation and if we ever moved to Yachats, we would probably visit every day they are open.

About 50 cents worth of a sand dollar.

Must be rough out there in the ocean!!!!!

One of the sea stars we came upon and tried to rescue.

So there you have it -  a beach in your backyard with beautiful sunsets, miles of uncrowded beaches to walk along, the sound of surf to put you to sleep, an amazing scenic area minutes aways, plus great coffee, tea and pastries.  You have to love camping along the coast in Oregon!  We sure do!!!

Trekking Together
Glenn & Carol

Devil's Churn & Strawberry Hill

On our recent camping trip at Beachside State Park (posting to come), we made stops to hike and view the Devil's Churn and Strawberry Hill and allow Glenn to try out his new camera - yeah!!!!

The Cape Perpetua Scenic Area is located just south of Yachats.  It is a beautiful area and if you are ever up that way, make sure to take some time to stop and see the various viewpoints.  Most are only a short easy hike away.  Devil's Churn is one of those viewpoints.

We parked at the Devil's Churn turnout area using a 5-day paid pass to allow us access to the many stops in Cape Perpetua.  There is also a short trail down to this area from the official Cape Perpetua Visitor Center just off Highway 101.

After a short descent down the trail we were greeted to the thundering sound of water crashing against rock.   The best time to see Devil's Churn is at high tide. Despite the tempatation to get close to the edge for that once in a lifetime picture, flashbacks to those warnings of sneaker waves kept us back at a safe distance.

Incoming waves at the start of the Devil's Churn......

...progress down through the channel......

....to the end where waves meet rock

We also walked the trail around the point which gave us a great panorama view of this area. Beautiful!!

Viewpoint of south coast area on Trail of Restless Waters 

Panoramic view of tidepools and ocean from the point

Our other stop just off Highway 101 was Strawberry Hill.  This quick pullout only has four parking spaces but we got there just as others were leaving.  This viewpoint is best visited at low tide when there are large areas of tidepools exposed and you can get close up views of seals soaking in the sun on the rocks.

Incoming water to the tidepool areas

 We were able to see a few tidepools despite the high tide and there were a few seals visible on the rocks. Even so, this are of the Oregon Coastline is beautiful and makes the stop and walk worth it.

A few seals soaking in the sun

North view at Strawberry Hill......

South view at Strawberry Hill

For more information on these and other viewpoints in the Cape Perpetua Scenic Area, click here.

Still to come --- Beachside State Park, Dean Creek Elk Viewing (with Elk), and our 10 mile hike along some amazing trails in Cape Perpetua.

Trekking Together
Glenn & Carol

Eel Lake & Lake Marie trails

June 9, 2015

While Medford was on a hot streak, we headed to the coast for a camping trip at William Tugman State Park. Located between North Bend and Reedsport, the park offers fishing at Eel Lake and close accessibility to the Oregon Dunes National Recreational Area. We were here though to relax and get in some hiking and we are happy to report success on both fronts.

Eel lake is a large, deep lake in a chain of water bodies along this part of the Oregon Coast. Currently there is a 3-mile trail along the south end of the lake that begins at William Tugman SP.  Plans are in the works to try and complete a trail around the entire lake which has 11.5 miles of shoreline.  So for now we had to settle on the shorter version which we found to be even shorter - 2 miles out -  due to some clear cutting along a slope that caused lots of windfall damage and made the trail very dangerous for the last mile.

The trail began near the day use area and crossed Eel creek via a small bridge.  Throughout our hike there were beautiful viewpoints of the lake and at many of those viewpoints there were benches for just sitting and taking in the view.  We were treated to various wildflowers along the trail which included Starflowers, Mexican Hedge Nettle, Yellow Woodland Violets, Foxglove, Spring Beauty, Oxalis, and a new flower for us - Fairy Lanterns,  .  We also saw a few Newts on the trail and in the lake.  Katie did take a dip or two in the lake but we made sure she didn't eat a newt!

Eel lake view from the day-use area

As we mentioned at the start of this post, the trail is closed after 2 miles.  Nothing prevented us from continuing as there is a trail, but with all of those logs on the hillside just waiting to slide down to the lake, we decided to turn around and hike back rather than risk an unwanted log ride.

Since Eel lake ended up being only a 4 mile hike (instead of 6 miles), we decided to drive Highway 101 north to the Umpqua River Lighthouse SP day-use area and hike the 1-mile loop trail around the smaller but beautiful Lake Marie.

We camped at this park a few years back and stayed in a cabin (spot #42) that had a beautiful view of the lake from the porch area.  When we arrived today, the campground was closed due to repaving but the day- use area was still open and very crowded. We hiked the loop trail once in each direction to make up for the two miles we were short on the Eel Lake trail and saw lots of folks on trail enjoying a beautiful, sunny yet windy day. This small lake sure is pretty and like the Eel Lake trail, there are many places where you can stop and take in a view of the lake. (pictures below are from our 2012 camping trip)

Lake Marie

Part of the trail around Lake Marie

Lake Marie

When we finished hiking Lake Marie, our hiking for the day had come to an end. Instead of one hike we were given a chance to hike two shoreline trails along two very beautiful lakes.  One was small in size, the other quite large.  One had many wildflowers while the other had very few.  On one we encountered many hikers yet we met only a single pair of hikers on the other. Sometimes you just don't know what a hike (or two) will lead to, but then again, that's why we hike!

Trekking Together
Glenn & Carol