Coos Bay - southern Oregon Coast

Day 57

Here on the Oregon coast we have begun to appreciate days that are only overcast with intermittent sprinkles - these are terrific weather days for us as opposed to the usual heavy rain and even hail. On the first 'nice' day Ron flew his glider on the beach. In the picture notice how the mountain meets the ocean in the background. This was the beach at the Nehalem Bay State park. Our campsite was separated from the beach by an enormous sand dune. Three black tailed deer walked through our campsite one morning and there were sign of elk everywhere, but we never spotted one .

We had hours and hours of sunshine on the 29th and took a look at Cape Arago which is near our newest campground at Coos Bay. There were seals everywhere we looked. You can hear them well before you see them. It sounds very much like a dog kennel with every dog barking. Many variety of seals haul their bulk out on the rocks at this spot on the Oregon Coast: stellar sea lions, harbor seals, elephant seals, California sea lions. Ron got to within 20 ' of one little guy. He also found seal skeletons - he will not be bringing one home!

We were able to see a tide pool area at low tide. The anemones were everywhere and star fish 'cemented' themselves to the rocks and were all kinds of colors. Little goby fish swam in the miniature pools with snails and small crabs. The area was teeming with life.

The local birders got very excited this week when word went out that a rare bird for the area had landed in Coos Bay. The Brown Booby ( now no jokes, Janis has already mentioned nude beaches) was way outside of its territory when it ended up here. Birders were driving from all over just to get a glimpse of it. We were part of the crowd, and with our scope we were able to get very good looks as it preened itself on a channel marker. This was actually a bird we had hoped to see while in the Keys last winter, so you can see how far off course it really was. The Brown Booby was bird number 417!

We're staying here for at least 1 1/2 weeks so I can get new glasses and we can order a new screen house. Our old one was stolen while we were on the Olympic Peninsula. It was in its bag on the picnic table while we left for a quick run into town. We are much more careful with our things now - so maybe it was a timely lesson

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Part of trip: 10,000 Miles

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