At the risk of repeating myself...Olympic is really remote...beaches that go on for miles and miles and the only reason there are people is that we were at one of only two camping sites on a 100 mile stretch of coast...the beaches are untouched...almost too untouched...the forest bones pile up for miles making the beaches almost inacessable as you are forced to risk life and limb (well okay just limb) climbing over about 60 feet of beached drift logs...some of the logs are six feet wide and many are upwards of 60 feet long...real trees...minus the branches which they probably lost on the long journey down whatever river brought them to the sea and as they made their way pushed by the waves and the wind onto the beach...there are pebbles on the beach too...well at about 8 inches across they are more like little rocks...all bunched up against the steep cliff boundary of the beach...the high tides and winter storm waves must be awe inspiring to behold...luckily for us the weather was overcast but quite warm...the wind deciding to give us a day of respite which we spent sunning ourselves...walking on the beach...observing the porpoises, sea otters and miriad sea birds...
The rock pools are interesting...the life does not seem to be as diverse as the caribbean...but green sea anenomies were a surprise to us.
We then travelled South to the place where Lewis and Clark's Corp of Discovery first stood on the shores of the Pacific Ocean...Cape Disappointment...it wasn't quite the "disappointment" that Praj said it was for them...but other than the interpretive center and the monstrously big Columbia River Mouth...it is not much to behold...of course most of the excitement was in standing on the historic site itself...
Fort Clatsop...the Corp's winter quarters on what is now the Oregon side of the Columbia river was a little mor interesting as we saw a replica of the original fort and were given a demonstration of the loading and firing of a flintlock rifle.
The Oregon coastline has a reputataion...and it is well deserved...mile upon mile upon mile of wonderful beaches broken beautifully by large rock formations jutting out into the deep blue Pacific...and we have only covered the first 50 miles of about 350 miles of coastline...I imagine that by the time we hit California, Karin will be as bored of the beautiful coast as she was of the mountains...nah, don't think so!
Once again a smattering of images is in the vlog...
