Whalehead Beach along the Oregon Coast Trail

After an astoundingly steep climb down an embankment, we were rewarded with a cove of vast expanse, 10 ft long "whip seaweed", boulders, giant driftwood trunks. ferns along a water-falling brook hidden along the cliff by overhanging raspberry vines.

We ascended by another less treacherous path, although it did involve removing my Keen Boots to traverse a rocky brook making its way to the Pacific across the wide beach.

My waterproof, wind resistant Columbia jacket has lived up to its billing.  I highly recommend searching the REI website for sales....coats are best purchased in early June...I bought four:  Kirsten's, Lydia's, and two for me.  (All half price)

WE've passed the rocky cliff zone that fronts the ocean, for now.  Grass covered dunes line the Hwy 101scenic  route.  A meadow flanks the right of the car as we head north. small farm houses sit at the foot of the mist covered high hills.  Small streams make their way to the ocean, their genesis being the mountains.

100 years ago a man named Samuel Something-or-Other, convinced the state of Oregon to protect its entire coastline.  And--SHOCK!--they did!  There is a walking path, similar to the Appalachian trail that one can hike along the entire coastline.  NO comercial!  No houses for the elite!  Just parks, and picnic benches, and a random toilet house.

Stonehenge of Oregon lines the shore.  We're here at low tide and a sandy beach is exposed with the boulders, some the size of small islands or a link in an atoll, bursting from the ocean as if from a lost world, reappearing for shock purposes, from within a troll's cavern.