Traveling on down the Oregon Coast

On Tuesday morning, we decided to go for a bike ride around Nehalem State Park.  The bike path took us by Nehalem Bay,

an airstrip (which is an unexpected thing to see in a state park),

 

and through a forest of moss-covered trees.

 

We rode our bikes down to the boat launch...

...where Chuck checked out the fishing on the bay with some guys who had gone out fishing that morning.  (They had only caught a few small fish.)

Since the park would refund our money, we decided to go ahead and leave today rather than stay until Thursday.  We had seen all we wanted to see in the area and were ready to head on down the coast. 

We were blessed with a sunny day for most of the day giving us some nice views of the coast.

We passed by Depoe Bay,

 

Whale's Cove,

and Yaquina Head Lighthouse.

 

 

We crossed over the Yaquina Bay bridge in Newport.  The monuments on both sides of the trusses look like miniature Empire State Buildings.

We could see Yaquina Bay to the east...

 

and the Pacific Ocean out to the west.

 

There were a lot of sea stacks as we got closer to Waldport.

We crossed another big truss bridge over Alsea Bay in Waldport.

 

Sometimes Hwy 101 went right by the beach.  All along the coast we have noticed tsunami evacuation route signs and sirens.  I wouldn't want to be here when a tsunami hit.

 

Occasionally, we would see these big beautiful houses right on the coast.  I don't think it would be very safe either if a tsunami hit.

After entering the Siuslaw National Forest,

 

we found a nice viewpoint to pull off where Chuck could stretch his legs a bit.

And then we headed back down the road again. 

We drove through a little bit of rain...

 

but mostly sun.

The trees and bushes along the coastline have a permanent wind-blown appearance.

View from the pull-off at Brays Point.

This part of Hwy 101 runs right along a tall cliff (that looks even taller from the passenger's seat of a motorhome).

We drove past the beautiful Heceta Head lighthouse...

...and got our first glimpse of the Oregon Dunes as we were heading into Florence, Oregon.

There are Oregon State Park and National Forest campgrounds every few miles all up and down the Oregon coast.  We drove on to the southern end of the Oregon Dunes and stopped at William M. Tugman State Park where we were going to stay for a couple of nights.

There were plenty of nice sites to choose from.  We stayed in site A-37.