Lighthouse, Fish Tacos and Trash Art in Bandon

Saturday we made our way to Bandon, a town in Coos County, set on the south side of the mouth of the Coquille River. It is a cute little town where we visited on a cold, windy but sunny day.

 

We had read, in one of the blogs, about a good restaurant called Tony's Crab Shack and so we had to try it.

WOW, we sat outside as we had Savannah with us. Joe had a crab sandwich and I had fish tacos, which were some of the best ones i had ever had. So delish!!!

 

 

 

After we were done, we walked along the boardwalk.

 

 

The art work in the background in the picture below was done by local school children.

 

 

 

 

The Washed Ashore Project builds large art sculptures of sea life made from plastic marine debris. Our unique art pieces are part of a traveling exhibition which includes educational signage and programs that encourage reducing, refusing, reusing and recycling.

What a great way to clean up the beaches and recycle the trash into something beautiful.

 

 

 

You can see the Coquille River Lighthouse across the water. The lighthouse, which was built in the late 1890's, is at Bullard Beach State Park where you can get tours of the tower given by volunteers.

 

 

 

 

 

We drove around the area. One of the places we stopped was Face Rock.

 

 

 

I just love all the rocks jutting out of the water, which is so quintessential of the Oregon Coast.

All this beauty and we even saw some wildlife in front of one of the lovely homes owed by some lucky people who enjoy these views everyday.

 

 

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Edson Creek

We had planned to stay at Cape Blanco a second night. we signed up and then decided to check out some other areas. We drove 5 miles north of Port Orford and turned on Sixes River Road for 4 miles until we reached Edson Recreation Site, a first come first serve campground set in an open meadow by Edson Creek, adjacent to Sixes River. It is a BLM campground. While we were checking it out, the cost came up to us as they had noticed we were Escapees. It turned out they have a place at Jojoba Hills. Like Huntley Park, going just a short distance away from the coast makes all the difference in the weather. We decided to burn our second night at Cape Blanco and so went back, packed up and headed back to Edson.

 

 

And who should be our new neighbors, but John and Linda who we met at Huntley and who told us about this place. Our other neighbors were also a couple we saw at Huntley. We talked to them for awhile while setting up our site. Savannah is very happy as she loves grass.

 

She was also happy to see Rose, John and Linda's little dog. We let them off their leaches and let them chase each other around. Then Savannah went up to their screen door smelling for Maggie, their cat. Maggie usually stays under a chair by the door but came to the door and they touched noses through the screen. Savannah is in love again.

We walked across the road to a nice beach on the river banks.

 

Tomorrow we will head back south to check out Bandon.

 

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Time in Southern Coast of Oregon

We spent some of my birthday, the 16th, driving through beautiful Northern Ca and into Oregon.

 

We just spent two nights in Brookings at Whale's Head Beach Resort, which we had stayed at in the past. This place has full hookups and a laundry, which we did while there. It is set on a steep hill and parking was challenging as Joe had to backup on a hill past two other sites to get to our assigned spot. There are a lot of cabins in this park, many of which are for sale. It is nicely landscaped and has a tunnel to get to the beach on the other side of 101. Besides laundry, the only other thing we did while there was to check out some camping spots in Gold Beach, which is just north of Brookings. We had read about some forest service and other campgrounds on the Rogue River. We checked them out and found a county park, Huntley Park. It is only seven miles from Gold Beach, but the weather is much warmer. There is typical fog and cold weather at the beach. So the next day, we left and headed for our new spot. We have a spot looking out at the Rogue River. Some sites are set among the many trees. Just a lovely spot and nice weather.

 

We saw a lot of the Jet Boats going up and down the river. We took one of the tours when we were in the area years ago.

We had some nice neighbors, John and Linda and their cute little dog Rose and Maggie the cat. Savannah was happy to make a friend. We would meet them again up the road. We would have liked to kayak the river. However, I had a little health issue. Don't want to really get into many details, but involved a BIG boil on butt. Ugggh. Painful and in a spot that made in hard to sit. After trying to self treat it, I ended up going to an urgent care and then two more follow ups, and getting antibiotics. We went into Brookings and so this took up most of three days. Sheesh, just got medicare this month and using it already. Definitely glad to have it as much better than that overpriced plan I had for the last year and ahalf. Anyway, in spite of this, we had a nice time at Huntley Park, another place we would stay at again.

We next went up to Port Orford where we got a spot at Cape Blanco State Park. It is a beautiful campground on the ocean side with a trail to the beach.

 

 

 

We went into town and had dinner at Griff's on the Dock, which is just located on a working dock. Great views of the harbor. We had an oyster shooter each, shared steamed clams and each had a bowl of clam choweder. Good, but not great.

 

 

 

 

Saw a raccoon on the side of the road on our way back home.

 

We stopped at a view point to check out the Cape Blanco Lighthouse. It is the oldest standing lighthouse on the Oregon Coast. It sits on the western most point of Oregon. There are nine lighthouses along the coast and we are going to try to at least take pictures of them all and maybe a tour or two at some of them.

 

 

Man, was it windy. I thought I would blow down the hill while trying to take pictures. We had been warned it gets very, very windy here and that is sure the case. Cold too. We decided to only stay one night. We had plans to go up the road towards Coos Bay and stay at a BLM site on the Sixes river. Their site states get away from the fog and wind and enjoy the sunshine. And so we will. Stay tuned.

 

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