Saturday, November 24, 2018

Greg and I spent Thanksgiving weekend in the Coos Bay area. We drove down Friday in the POURING rain, and since the weather was so abysmal we did a fun indoor activity: wine-tasting! We visited three tasting rooms in the little town of Elkton, which I visited on a much nicer day back in 2012:

We drove on, stopping at the Dean Creek Elk Viewing Area. Most of the elk were far away, but we saw a few that were close:

We checked into our yurt at Sunset Bay State Park, then backtracked 20 minutes into town for dinner.

The next day we did a hike that started at the Sunset Bay day use area:

Before long we reached a nice viewpoint:

Sunset Bay:

Hiking on we continued to see cool rock formations and great views:

We also had views of the Cape Arago Lighthouse:

Looking back along our route:

Erosion is constant at the coast. We saw this broken fence dangling along the cliff edge:

Loved the clash of water and rock:

Saw several cool mushrooms:

As we approached the main part of Shore Acres State Park we crossed the old tennis courts:

Cool cannonball rocks:

Louis J. Simpson built a mansion here in 1907. It burned down in 1921, was rebuilt in 1928, and then the property was sold to the state in 1942. The second mansion was razed in 1948. This observatory now sits on the site. It has nice views and interpretive signs explaining the history and geology of this place:

Looking north from the Observatory. Starting to get colder and cloudier:

Looking south:

The botanical garden from the Simpson days is still here. We would return in a few hours to see the holiday light show here:

We made a loop by walking back on the old Simpson driveway:

After some hot tea back at the yurt we drove to the third state park in the chain, Cape Arago. We walked down a short trail to see the sea lions. What a racket!

There were a lot of them gathered on that rock out there, which we would see from a roadside viewpoint the next day:

After dinner we went back to the park to see the holiday lights. The backup of cars waiting to get in had been VERY long earlier, but later in the evening we only had to wait at the staging area for about 10 minutes.

An underwater scene:

I’ve been wanting to see the holiday lights at Shore Acres for decades, so I’m glad I finally got to see them!

Sunday, November 25, 2018

Today we did a hike in Cape Arago State Park. We started at a locked gate at the day use area and hiked past a “pack trail” sign.

At first we were on a road:

Then we were on a trail:

After about a mile we reached a signless T-junction. We saw a feature on the map to our right called Arago Peak so we decided to see what we could see. We were now on an old road that was brushy in spots:

We reached a big grassy area, stayed to the right, and kept going:

Now we were in an old clearcut:

We topped out in an open area in the clearcut:

From here there was a limited view of the area surrounding Coos Bay:

And some of the mountains to the east:

We could see a bit of ocean to the west:

According to the map Arago Peak was further along the road, so we kept going. From this point the road is in really great shape. It’s timber company land and they drive up from the Seven Devils Road to the east. We spotted this cute rabbit ahead of us:

It turns out there really isn’t much of a peak. We walked past the spot on the map and realized that was it. Not prominence, no marker, no view. So we turned around and went back to the T-junction and continued straight to finish our loop, still following old road:

The trail was in REALLY bad shape in spots. It appeared as though Friday’s downpour had washed away a lot of soil:

We passed this picnic table which hasn’t had a view in a very long time:

We also passed the concrete remains of this old WWII bunker. We were dismayed to see the all the vandalism and graffiti here:

We continued following the old road down to the Cape Arago Highway which we crossed. The trail took us through the trees and then to some ocean views:

We reached the roadside Sea Lion Viewpoint / Simpson Reef Viewpoint:

We could see and hear the sea lions on the rocks out there. I was glad I had my binoculars. We even saw sea otters frolicking in the ocean! My camera’s zoom lens wasn’t long enough to get a shot of them, but it was cool:

We crossed the highway for the last bit back to the car, and spotted these cool fungi along the way:

Nice hike! 6 miles, 870′ elevation gain.