Plan G... or was it H?

The lonely cry of the fog horn at Cape Arago lulled us to sleep as we lay in our camper along the Oregon coast. Instead of heading east towards home we pointed the truck west. How could you not go to the coast when we were this close? After all, the coast was Barb’s old stomping grounds where she had many memories of camping as a child. 

Arago Lighthouse

Our first stop was her aunt and uncle’s house in Grant Pass (I forgot to take a picture). Her dad’s brother. She stops whenever she is in the area. Ron and Diana have a beautiful house right on the Rouge River. We visited with them for about a two hours and continued our journey west to the coast.

Each time we come to this area I can see Barb reminiscing as she tells me stories from her childhood. So much has changed since we were here last time in 2016. Her grandmother in Cave Junction passed away in the fall of 2016 at the age of 94 and just last year her stepmother passed away.

Our destination….Sunset Beach State Park Campground. 

Our site at Sunset Bay

This is the first time we have been able to stay in this particular campground since being on the road. All the other times we were in this area we have had our 5^th wheel and just would not fit so we stayed at Bastendorff Beach County Park. But this time we had the pickup camper and could finally stay at Sunset Beach, the place where she and her family camped pretty much every year growing up. I too had stayed here one time in the past. The year was 1998 when we came out from Wisconsin to visit. I remember parts of it like it was yesterday. Hard to believe it was 22 years ago but looking at the pictures it is definitely believable! Barb’s dad, stepmother, and her brother Shorty were with us were on that trip. Sadly, they all are no longer with us but it was nice to relive the memories.  

Barb's dad and brother on our trip here in '98

I don’t remember what site we stayed in in ’98 but our sense of Deja’ vu made us believe it was very close to the site we were in this year. As we sat in our campsite we talked about the last time we were here and how the people next to us must have cringed when we pulled in, a group of 6 adults, 4 young kids and a dog. One thing I do remember about that trip is that it was not quiet!

So what did Barb and I do while we were here this time? Both days we went crabbing on the piers in town. Why? Cuz that is what you do when you camp here. That is what Barb has done everytime she has camped here for over 50 years. Crabbed at the same pier at the same spot on the pier for over 50 years. She says about the only thing that has changed are the docks. 

They used to be wooden slats where the water would slosh up between the boards. Now the piers are concrete. It is actually quite fun and a very relaxing day. We love walking the docks and looking at all the different boats. 

“They” say that the best time for crabbing is 2 hours before high tide and 2 hours after but we had luck all day long. We set our pots with bait… fish heads or chicken, throw them in and wait 15-20 minutes and pull them up. The majority of the crabs are too small but every 2^nd or 3^rd pull you will get a keeper. Day 1 we ended up with about a dozen. Day 2 only 4.

We had the piers pretty much to ourselves until prime time, those two hours surrounding high tide. Then the piers were filled with people, many with little kids. We could not help but think about the memories that they were making and would those small children return as adults with their kids and make the same memories…

At one point a strong wind came up and knocked over our chairs, which in turn knocked over our 5 gallon bucket containing our keeper crabs. You should have seen us scrambling to recover those crabs before they made it back into the water!

It is interesting to see how much the tide changes throughout the day. The piers actually float up and down with the tide throughout the day. Here is a comparison of the same post on the pier at different times of the day. See how much the water has risen?

Low tide, see all the barnacles on the piling?

Not quite high tide but a lot higher than the picture on the left!

The crab was delicious! We had plain crab and butter one day and the next Barb made some awesome crab cakes.

Of course no trip to the coast is complete without letting the dogs run on the beach. And oh, how they loved it! 

Day 3 of our coastal trip we moved up the coast to Yachats where we had lunch and stopped by the Yachats Brewery. 

Our plan was to boondock at a pullout outside of Yachats. Once we got there it was nothing like was listed on Freecampsites.net so we went to Plan F. At least I think it was Plan F, we have had so many plans change on this trip, We lost track. Plan D was to head up to Tillamook, visit the cheese factory and then stay at the Blue Heron Winery which has free camping.   We were well on our way when we discovered it was closed until further notice. Well, that is not good, it is the only reason we were heading that far north! We had no Plan G..... until we saw this sign!

So on a whim we turned right to see where this road would lead us, more on that next time!

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