The Yaquina Headlands

To quote from the handout from the federal fee site, the Yaquina Head outstanding natural area. Managed by the BLM. "Yaquina Head is a narrow, coastal headland extending one mile into the Pacific Ocean. Formed by ancient lava flows, Yaquina Head's hard basalt cliffs and coves have endured the pounding ocean surf for 14 million years."  So it was decided to put a light on it! Maybe ships would quit hitting it. So in 1866 President Andrew Johnson signed an executive order and by August of 1873 they finally got it lit. Today it is automated, but there were Lighthouse Keepers until 1966 when it was automated. The Oregon Trail and the California Trail had the west coast booming, but no real roads, so most everything was brought in by boat. The light was made in France.
       This beach is lava rock, beat up by the ocean for some million years and thrown at the basalt cliffs a high tide in violent winter storms. Smoothest, roundest lava rock I have ever seen.  This headland lies a few miles north of Newport. Agate Beach is just to the south and the waves were pretty big today. There were surfers just south of this headland, giving it a go.
     Down the stairway to the cobble beach there were  people  watching the waves and now and then in the water there were seals watching the people, and the birds on the rocks watching everyone.

In the afternoon I drove down to the old Harbor Part of Newport, down on the wharf. There are fish stores and restaurants and shops and because it was Saturday lots of people.  I went into a restaurant called Moe's and had a blackened salmon sandwich with a cabbage and lettuce salad covered with shrimp. It was wonderful. I watched shop workers carrying fresh fish from the dock to the restaurants, pretty fresh!

      After lunch I crossed over the Hwy 101 bridge to South Beach and spent some time in the Oregon Coastal Aquarium. They had some display's where you were under the water and the fish swam over and under you. Seals, shore birds. It was a lot of great information about the ocean there.
      The day had warmed up and the clouds broke to give this sunny afternoon to spend here in Newport. Driving around town I could see a lot a nice landscaping in many neighborhoods. Plenty of rental houses. There was a beach community feel down along Nye Beach. And houses on the hills over the harbor looking out to sea. It is 48 miles inland to Corvallis. I found Newport to be a nice setting here on the Oregon Central Coast.

     Tomorrow I will load up the Mothership again and move a couple of hours up the coast. Past Lincoln City, Tillamook and Cannon beach to Seaside for a couple of days touring around there.

This is Will by the Yaquina Headlands signing off.