Continuing South on US 101 - Tillamook and Florence Oregon

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Our next planned stop as we work our way down the Oregon coast is Tillamook. It isn't very far at under 70 miles but there are a few things we would like to check out and it makes more sense to stop nearby rather than have long day trips out of some other stop. Our stop in Tillamook is the Elks Lodge. Well, not actually the lodge per se, but the campgrounds they run just on the southern edge of town. This is the first time the lodge and camping area are not within walking distance. The campgrounds are very nice. They have 21 spots with roughly half of them being pull thru full hookup. They even have reasonable wi-fi. Another 15 or so spots are being put in and they are nearly ready to go. It wasn't too busy this time of year so we pick out a spot and get setup. After the Seattle football game is over, the camp host swings by to get us registered and provide lots of info about things to do in the area. It is a very well run place.

Our Rig Watched Over By Elk

New Sites at Tillamook Elks

Night in Tillamook

We only are staying 4 nights and since the weather forecast is better early in our stay, we head to nearby Cape Meares State Scenic Viewpoint. There is no camping here but it has a reasonably nice day use area. The main draw is the lighthouse that is there. It is no longer in use but is open for tours. Of course the tour season ended in September so we can only see the outside. This lighthouse is interesting in that, as we walk from the parking lot down the path towards it, we are well above the light. It is only 40 feet tall but does sit 161 feet above sea level. We had managed to get there mid-morning so there were too many people there yet. The morning fog was just starting to burn off allowing for some good views.

Above Cape Meares Lighthouse

Short and Stubby Lighthouse

There were a few geocaches in the park that led us to a couple of the trails in the area. The first interesting spot we were taken to was the "Octopus Tree". It is a huge spruce tree that for some reason had grown up with 8 trunks and not a one of them was in the center like you might expect. There is spruce tree highlighted in the park. It is 144 feet tall with a diameter of 15.5 feet. It was impressive but not quite as large as some of the ones we found in Washington state. I suspect the redwoods we will see in Northern California will be significantly larger.

Octopus Tree

Big Spruce at Cape Meares

We hadn't grabbed our hiking sticks as we went to the lighthouse, but we found ourselves doing some serious hiking after checking out the big trees. One of the paths on the north side of the park works its way down to the waterline. It was a slippery walk but even without our sticks, we managed to make it all the way. We did skip the last 10 feet of elevation drop since it was steep and required use of a rope. The beach here wasn't all that appealing so we soaked in the view from just above water level.

Hiking the Woods

Overlooking Pacific Ocean

At End of Path

Nice View at Cape Meares

By the time we finally got back to the parking lot, the place was pretty crowded. We found a picnic table in a central grassy area and had our lunch while a white tail deer was eating her lunch of grass just 15 feet away. I guess having lived on 50 acres in western New York, we have become so accustomed to deer that we don't give them much thought and this one seemed to have the same attitude towards us. At times it meandered close enough that I was positive I could have jumped on it's back. It seemed that all the other visitors found the sight of a deer this close to us interesting and eventually one of them got too close while trying to get a picture and the deer moved out of reach.

From here, we head a bit further south to Cape Lookout. The hike is about 4.5 miles long in total and has about 1000 feet in elevation change. It isn't the easiest hike but not too strenuous. The parking area was nearly full which surprised us for a Monday afternoon. Obviously this is a popular hike. The trail is in great shape and is pretty wide for most of it. We really didn't need our hiking sticks for this one but had them anyway. The trail mainly follows the southern edge of the cape and since you are about 400 feet above the water, the views can be great - just don't get too close to the edge. Chris seems to be very adept at maintaining her rather lengthy safety zone on hikes like this as I get close to the edge trying to get the best view for a photograph.

Overlook Along Cape Lookout

When we got to the end of the trail at the tip of the cape, there are at least a dozen people sitting around and chatting. As is usual, somebody will as us "where you guys from?" We tend to pause since it always seems to be a trick question. Should we say Tillamook since that is where our home is presently. Should we say Florida since that is our domicile? Or should we say Rochester NY? It has been nearly 15 months and one might think we would have a good answer for that question by now given how often we are asked it. But we don't.

From Tip of Cape Lookout

It was a nice walk back as the sun was getting lower in the sky. There were several people heading out as we were coming back. Maybe they were going to see the sunset from the cape? If so, I don't relish the thought of needing to do the hike back in the dark with just a headlamp or flash light.

As expected the next couple days were a bit rainy. Not all day steady rain, but enough to limit our outdoor activities. Just a couple miles from the Elks campground is Munson Creek Falls. The trail that goes back to the falls was cut short about halfway there. Apparently a flood had taken down lots of trees and there hasn't been any effort to clean things up and reopen the trail. If only I had kept my chainsaw, I could have done some volunteer work here.

Munson Creek Falls

The last full day took us into Tillamook. Our first stop being the Tillamook Air Museum. It is housed in a former blimp hangar. It is a big building. So big that you can see it for quite a distance when driving through town. The building was built in 1943 to house blimps used patrol the Pacific coast for enemy submarines during World War II. The hangar is 1072 feet long and 296 feet wide which works out to be just over 7 1/4 acres in area! Another amazing fact is that is is a wooden structure not steel. Steel was required for the war effort so wood was used. The good thing is there was (and still is) a lot of lumber in this part of the country. At 15 stories high, they were able to house 8 of the blimps in the hangar. Actually there were two identical hangars but the other one burned to the ground in 1992 while it was being used to store hay.

Entrance Sign to Museum

BIG Building!

Interior Wood Truss Structure

Since the early 1990's, the hangar is used for the air museum. The building is not conditioned and has fairly poor lighting so it wasn't like walking around the air and space museum in Washington DC but it was still enjoyable. There are numerous (non-operational) jet simulators that you can sit in and be amazed at all the dials, buttons and levers. Outside the hangar is a huge cargo plane. From the specs listed inside, it would be able to haul our motorhome if it could only be made flight ready. There are several partitioned off rooms with a multitude of displays. It was interesting to see pictures of the construction of the two hangars. What an engineering feat. Another of the rooms was just a little bit odd, at least to us. There were probably a dozen or more dioramas depicting various battles or military bases from WWII. There were thousands of little army guys, model planes and some model ships that were created from 2 by 4's. Let's just say, the guys that put these things together have never fully reached adulthood.

Plane Inside Huge Hangar

Trainer

A Face Only a Mother Could Love

Interior of Cargo Plane

Models Galore

Take Me to Your Leader

After the museum, we headed just north of town to the Tillamook Cheese Factory. They are in the middle of construction of a brand new and huge visitor's center which meant the tour portion of the factory is not available at this time, but they still have a very large building that goes into the raising of the cows, collecting the milk and making the cheese and ice cream. There is a cheese sampling area with about half a dozen various cheeses to sample for free. This leads you to the large coolers where they have all the various cheese products for sale. We pick up some Hot Habanero Jack cheese which has become my all time favorite cheese. We hadn't planned on getting any ice cream but just as we went to head out the door after paying for the cheese, the sky opened up with a torrential downpour. We took that as a sign to wait it out while getting some ice cream.

Schedule for Farmer, Dog and Cow on Dairy Farm

Display at Tillamook Cheese Factory

We had pretty much seen what we intended to to see while here, so now we head on US 101 south again for about 100 miles, this time heading to Carl G. Washburne State Park. They don't take reservations here, so we are hoping that coming in on a Thursday in mid-October we will be able to score a site. We stop at a rest area along the way and have an incredible view of the waves crashing into the rocks just below our rig. We are glad we followed the advice of a fellow RVer who last March told us heading south on US 101 has the advantage of nearly all the pullouts and rest stops will be on the right hand side of the road. A little tip like that was something I likely would have never even considered. We eventually get to the park which isn't large having only 50 sites, but we find one site that looks good and we fit in it fine. Full hookup, 50 amp is a plus.

Prime Spot at Rest Stop

Gull Poses

The real downside to this place is it appears to be in a black hole when it comes to communications. There is no over the air television to be had. Even more surprising is the fact there is no cell reception on either Verizon or T-Mobile even using the cell booster I had installed back in June. Maybe it shouldn't be too surprising, but we don't enjoy being completely off the grid in this sense. After talking with our neighbors who are volunteers at Heceta Head Lighthouse just down the road, we find there is one picnic table across the highway in the day use area where you can sometimes get enough signal for a text or possibly a call. If you want data, you need to drive about 4 miles south to the parking lot at the Sea Lion Caves. A place like this is where having Amazon Prime with TV shows and movies already downloaded onto our phones comes in quite handy to at least have some evening entertainment now that the days have gotten so short. Six nights of "No Service" wasn't too fun. If we ever decide to do lighthouse volunteer duty, I suspect it won't be at this place.

Our first day trip is to the town of Florence about 15 miles south of the campground. It's a cute little town and we actually find a guy with a fruit and vegetable stand with good products and prices. We stock up and then wander around town a bit until being chased back to the car by a rain shower. We find a library to wait out the rain and get caught up a bit on some internet stuff. As we head back to camp, we stop by to check out the Florence Elks Lodge. In town at the lodge, they have about 20 sites. They look nice and there are only a few people staying there. This may have been a better choice for this area? A little further out of Florence is the second campground that the Elks run. This one has 40 sites and is a bit more like the one we were just at in Tillamook.

Bridge Over Siuslaw River in Florence

The next day was pretty nice so we decided to check out the lighthouse at Heceta Head. It isn't a far drive, but there is a trail that goes from the campground to the lighthouse. It was a bit of a strenuous hike with lots of ups and downs as you wind your way through the woods. There were numerous geocaches along the way to distract us and give us a breather. When we got to the lighthouse, we ran into our campground neighbors who were working that day. After talking with several of the volunteers, we joined in on one of the lighthouse tours. They have lots of info to share and we do get to go into the lighthouse, but you are not allowed to go up into the tower. We never make it down to the caretaker's house since we still have the walk back to camp. The round trip is just under 6 miles.

Dew Covered Web

View from Trail Above Heceta Head Lighthouse

Beautiful Lighthouse

Still in Operation

View Along Trail

We take it easier the next day and just head to Darlingtonia State Natural Site. It is a small park that is dedicated to the rare plant that grows there. The Darlingtonia Californica is a carnivorous plant also known as the cobra lily. It was late in the season so we didn't even expect to see the plants but were surprised at how many of them are there. They are a lot larger than we expected and are quite striking. The boardwalk that goes through the wetlands permits visitors to get a good up close look at them.

Large Number of Cobra Lily

Another day trip took us just a bit north to Cape Perpetua Scenic Area. This park is part of the US Forest Service. There is a nice visitor center with a good view of the Pacific Ocean. At the right time of year, you get a chance to watch whales. There is a small campground and some hiking trails but the main reason for us being here is to see some of the unique water features along the coast. There is a half mile trail from the visitor center to the coast that even has a tunnel under US 101 so people don't need to dodge car traffic. The loop just to the south takes you to the Spouting Horn and Thor's Well which are both situated next to Cook's Chasm. We had timed our visit here to correspond with high tide since this is when these natural water "features" really come to life.

At Cape Perpetua

Splash!

The Spouting Horn is created by a small cave underneath the surface of the rocky coastline that has a hole up through the top of it. As a wave comes in, the force of the water compresses the air in the cave and with no other direction to go, it forces a large plume of air and water. How much gets expelled is a function of how high the tide is and how large the wave is. It was quite fascinating to just stand and watch the horn do its thing. Watching the waves come in and trying to guess how forceful the next blow would be.

Spouting Horn Blows

Stay Back

Just a couple hundred feet from the Spouting Horn is Thor's Well. The top of it is circular hole about 15 feet in diameter. Beneath the surface is some cave like opening. As a wave comes in,  the water is forced up and through the hole spilling all around the opening. But just as quickly as the water comes up, the water that didn't spill over the edge is sucked back down the hole looking like some sort of giant drain. When we first arrived, there was one guy out on the rocks right next to the hole with his camera and tripod. The footing looked questionable and he was definitely getting wet. As he started back shore, I heard somebody at the overlook express his relief that we didn't witness the guy falling in. We went out part way to the hole. Carefully going from high spot to high spot on the rocks while trying to time the waves coming in. We opted not to get that close figuring that wouldn't be a pleasant way to go! In all honesty, the view from the overlook, although further away, provides a better viewing angle to watch the water perform its magical dance. Here is a video of some of the action.

We continued to walk along the rocky shore to the north, checking out the various small channels that permitted the waves to come crashing in creating impressive splashes. Back up on the trail, we head past Cape Cove beach to a place called Devil's Churn. Basically a narrow inlet, maybe 100 feet wide by 600 feet inward. As the waves come in, the water creates a frothy looking mixture reminiscent of a washing machine on steroids. There is a path and steps that go down to the churn. From there, it is simply a matter of how close one is willing to get to the thing. There are plenty of signs about how dangerous the area is, but it seems they would only entice some thrill seeker to do something dumb.

Cape Cove Beach

Devil's Churn

There is a path that heads up to an observation area about 150 feet over the sight. If you are visiting, there is a large parking area right off of US 101 which makes for easier access. The same exists for the area overlooking the Spouting Horn and Thor's Well if all you want to do is the standard passing by tourist thing. By now we have spent the whole morning exploring this small portion of the Oregon coast. We take the trail back to the visitor's center and find a picnic table for our lunch. We hadn't planned much beyond what we already checked out here this morning so we investigated while we ate. The solution was close by.

Saint Perpetua trail starts from behind the visitor center and isn't all that long of a hike at a total of 2 miles out and back. But it does provide some serious elevation change in that short distance with over 700 feet of climbing. The park map listed the hike as "difficult but worth it". I used their tag line to convince Chris to go for it. The end result gets you to the highest viewpoint on the Oregon coast. Of course, just like the things we saw this morning, there is a paved road up to the destination, so you don't need to put in all that effort if you don't want to.

There are quite a few switchbacks required to make the trail head up this steep of a slope, but nearly the complete trail is in dense tree cover, so it was reasonably pleasant. Any time I heard Chris whimper, I remind her it will be "worth it!" There was one geocache on the way up and it took us a long time to find it since we had it nearly 80 feet away from the posted coordinates. The long delay while looking for it gave us plenty of time to catch our breath before making the final push up the hill. The view from up top was quite nice but I'm pretty sure it looked better to us than to the couple that had driven to the top! We headed to another trail that starts up top but only to search for another geocache.

View from Top of Cape Perpetua

The walk down was nice since the trail was dry and had good footing. When we got near the visitor center, we had the option to head on a different trail to see a giant spruce tree. Of course it was going to add another mile or so to the hike and the legs were plenty tired by now so we just head to the car and back to camp.

With one full day remaining, we spend it doing a six mile hike. It was another one of those hikes we would have never discovered if not for geocaching. A couple miles south of Heceda Head lighthouse we saw a bunch of geocaches all clustered together on the map in the national forest. The trailhead was a bit of a drive up Forest Road #58 but we eventually got to Horse Creek Campground. The campground is intended for people that go camping with their horses. The sites are good sized and each one had some sort of corral so your horses have a place to spend the night too. There was only one travel trailer setup but we never saw anybody around.

Our experience with horse trails has generally been bad. They usually are very torn up and either quite muddy or sandy depending on what part of the country they are in. There was a series of caches that followed Scurvy Ridge trail and Horseshoe Lane - an old forest road reverting back to nature. As it turned out, the trail was in excellent shape. The steep drive to the trailhead had the benefit of making the 6 mile hike be relatively level. The trail maps at intersections along the way were obviously intended for riders on horseback. Even on her tippy toes, Chris found it difficult to read the map. A series of 18 geocaches was spaced around the loop with an additional two down a spur trail. We managed to find all but one of them. It was a great morning hike and it just started to sprinkle as we got back to the car. Perfect timing on our part.

Spooky Moss Covered Trees

Tall Map

Even with our lack of outside communication, we found we could generally keep up with email, news and weather forecasts by checking them when we were out and about in areas with good cell coverage. Although this isn't the most convenient approach, it was okay. If we come through here again, we might just stay in town at the Elks Lodge.