The Oregon Coast spans some fantastically beautiful scenery.  Driving along US 101 in the summer can be a bit frustrating at times stuck behind the travel trailers and rvs making their way north or south along the highway, but there is a reason so many are there.  People ask me what the favorite spot I have along the long coastline.  That is a lot like the question what your favorite travel place in the world is.  There are simply too many. One recent spot I discovered was the mystical charms to be discovered atop the Great Dune of Cape Kiwanda.

GENERALITIES OF A COASTAL VENTURE

Summer is the season most venture to the coast.  Winters can be stormy and wet.  There is a definite reason the coastline is so replete with forests and greenery. Shoulder seasons can still be good, if you luck out on the weather. That said, there can be something said for witnessing the power of nature during a winter storm on the coast.  It rarely snows on the coast – the Coast Range is another matter – and crowds diminish dramatically from the summer.  Hours at tourist stops, including restaurants and museums also dim or simply vanish.  Buyer beware.

Astoria, Seaside, Cannon Beach, Rockaway, Oceanside, Otter Crest, Yaquina Head, Newport, Bandon, Capes Perpetua and Arago, Heceta and Orford Heads, the list of natural magic of the Oregon Coast goes on and on as you move south to the California border.

So, pick a favorite.  Hmm.  Maybe it depends on the last journey.  In this case, Pacific City, home to Cape Kiwanda and the dory fleet. 

HOME OF THE DORY FLEET

The Pacific City dory fleet has launched off the sands of Cape Kiwanda – there is no port at Pacific City – for over a hundred years.  Dory boats are traditionally shallow draft, flat bottomed boats with no keel and a narrow transom or double-ended.  The flat bottoms allowed them to be stacked on a mother vessel when launched in ocean bays. 

Dorries date back to several hundred years.  In North America, many became a main asset for fleets working the fishing grounds of the Grand Banks in the North Atlantic.  The little boats were launched from a mother ship eliminating the need for handlines on the main ship for catching fish.  A narrow transom and pointed bow made for a boat that could ride waves easily.  A flat bottom made for an unstable boat until weight is added – fishing catch – making the boat more stable and easier to handle.

Originally rowboats, they still use oars – sometimes sails – though big outboard motors are the main means of conveyance at Pacific City. Drift boats used for float fishing along inland rivers are dories. The big motors are stuck on larger, flat transoms – a modern Pacific City design – allowing much easier launches and exciting ends to a day of fishing.  Launching off the beach means the fishermen can put a line into the sea in five minutes.

DORIES AND PACIFIC CITY

Pacific City got its origin in 1893, first platted as Ocean Park on the Nestucca River with its first hotel built two years later.  The town was renamed Pacific City in 1909 to avoid confusion with Ocean Park, Washington on the Long Beach Peninsula. 

Fishing over-harvesting from gillnetting depleted Nestucca Bay of salmon by the early 1920s.  Fisherman switched to surf-launched dories fishing in the open ocean.  Commercial fishing vessel development led most commercial-oriented fishermen away from the dories.  The dories stayed alive with recreational fishermen, though today, there is a mix of recreational and commercial.

The beach on the south side of Cape Kiwanda provided a sheltered launch location.  Summer onshore winds – a lee shore – from the northwest are ameliorated by the sandstone headland of the cape.

A large parking lot owned by Tillamook County serving public access the Cape Kiwanda State Natural Area. A paved ramp offers the dorymen a path to the beach from where they launch their trailered craft from.  

On warm summer weekends, the whole scene at the Cape’s parking lot becomes a bit of a circus.  The parking lot requires a $10 day fee – you can use the annual pass also offered by Tillamook County.  A smaller lot is adjacent serving the large brewpub for Pelican Brewing.

THE PELICAN

Like other coastal towns, breweries have made large impacts on local tourism. Fort George Brewery (along with Astoria Brewing, and Buoy in Astoria; Rogue Brewing in Newport; and other breweries in other towns along the coast.  Pelican Brewing is another example of real estate’s famous motto – “location, location, location”.  The brewpub was established in 1996 right on the beach next to the parking lot for visitors to the Cape and the beach. 

Sitting out on the patio, it is arguable that a better brewpub location exists in the world.  Sitting with a view of the Cape and Haystack Rock – not the only Haystack Rock found on the Oregon Coast – with your dog lying in the sand alongside.  Watching the kites flying in the breeze and neophyte surfers learn in the relatively easy waves while sipping one of their many beers is a popular afternoon stop for many.  The hardest thing can be to find parking, even at $10.

The beers used to be produced here, but Pelican – like Fort George, Rogue and to a lesser degree, Buoy – has larger ambitions.  Production for Pelican has moved a half hour northeast to the larger county seat of Tillamook.  The brewery has two other smaller brewpubs producing beer at Cannon Beach and at Lincoln City.  Pelican has won many awards for their beers and especially for the brewpub ambiance here at Pacific City.

THE CAPE

Fishing and beer.  The main star remains the natural beauty of Cape Kiwanda.  Haystack Rock sits 327 feet above the ocean.  Unlike its namesake further north in Cannon Beach, the haystack is not accessible even at low tide.  The rock sits out in the ocean about a half mile from the shoreline.  This haystack is also taller than the Cannon Beach monolith which stands at 235 feet.  Both rocks are federally protected wildlife refuges as part of the Oregon Islands National Wildlife Refuge serving as nesting grounds for many birds.

Rising above the scene at Pelican, the dory beach and the sandstone cape is the Great Dune.  Topping out at 220 feet, the views from the top sands of the Dune dramatically reveal the coastline from Cape Lookout to the north and Cascade Head to the south.  Long tracts of beaches invite discovery.  The close at hand geology of the cliffs reveals itself in jaw-dropping fashion

The cape geologically consists of sandstone as opposed to the harder basalt of Haystack Rock sitting offshore.  The rock has given some protection to softer cape from winter storms blowing in from the southwest.  At one time, the cape used to extend out to Haystack Rock.  Erosion is a continual process.  Magnificent arches and tunnels in the cliffs form and collapse with time as the ocean continues to gnaw at the coastline.  A line of basalt at the south edge of the cape points out to the rock, a reminder of times past.

THE GREAT DUNE

The Great Dune is a big dollop of sand thrown up by winds on top of the sandstone layers of Cape Kiwanda.  There are fence lines on the cape side of the dune to keep visitors from getting too close to cliff edges – several people have died falling from precipices lying beyond the fences. 

The orange and yellow layers of sandstone stand out against the blue crashing waves below, a general sort of trail leads up from the beach below past the parked rigs and trailers of the dories out fishing in the local waters.  After a gain of maybe eighty feet of elevation – the walk up through the soft sand is best done in bare feet though good sandals are useful for some areas on top where sand has been blown away – you come to the fence line.  A fenced path leads out on the cape to more views.  You can also wander to a view of a great sandstone seastack rising above the cape on its north side. 

ONWARD AND UPWARD

Most people stop along the fences. Some will still sneak over to see the cape closer. Even more magic awaits atop the Great Dune, however.

There is no “right” way to go up the Dune. A fair path leads up on the west side, but there is one on the east side. Both of these “paths” take the Dune on in a longer and more gradual manner. There is nothing to say you cannot simply walk straight up the Dune. The sand is soft, but also deep. Each step up equals a half step back.

Ribbons of exposed sandstone sometimes need to be crossed – depending upon your “route”. Barefoot is the best way to climb, but some kind of footwear – sandals, flip flops or shoes – makes the harder stuff easier to cross.

Atop the great dune

Slow, but sure, does the trick. A few pine trees struggle on the top with European sand grasses beneath. Now, the views reach far, from Cascade Head above Neskowin to the south while Cape Lookout juts far out to the north after a long expanse of more beaches to explore.

Footprints abound atop the Great Dune inviting further exploration. On the north side of the Dune, a deep cauldron plunges down into the sea. Look carefully and you will discover tunnels created by wave action through some of the sandstone cliffs. One of those tunnels widened with the waves into an arch. The arch eventually collapsed leaving behind a new giant seastack, a close-at-hand, lighter in color, Haystack Rock three, complete with a sea tunnel of its own at its base.

Walk carefully around the east side of the cauldron. Here, care is needed closer to the cliff edges.  The fall here is much higher than earlier from the cape below.  Your care is rewarded with grander views of the ocean’s never-ending actions on the sandstones of the cape. Two large tunnels through the cliffs awash as waves continue to course the lengths.

On the north edge, below a large rock named by some locals as Turtle Rock – it takes some imagination – sits along the sea, with wide beaches stretching north to the dunes of Sandlake and the headland of Cape Lookout.

When it is time to return, a good plunge step – heel first – or modified ski jump turn gets you down the Dune much quicker than the time it took you to climb.

Those footprints you struggled so hard to create going up or coming down wash away in the wind as sands create a new picture each new day.

THE SPIT

For another ecological view of the oceanfront area, you can head a mile south to the Bob Straub State Park, named for a former governor, a strong supporter of Oregon’s Beach Law and opponent to a proposed use of the Nestucca Spit for a highway. 

From the day-use parking lot just south of the Pacific Avenue bridge over the Nestucca River, you can walk out to explore the environment of the spit going out along the ridge covered in sand grasses above the beach and back along the bay and Nestucca River side in about a five-mile loop trail shared with equestrians.  I walked out towards the end of the spit along the Dune Ridge “Trail”. “Trail” because the sand grasses make it difficult to figure out which path is the right one. Sometimes, you just go on the one with horse dung. The grasses were waist-deep to chest-high in a few spots. The wind whips and the crowds of Cape Kiwanda dwindle out here.

This is probably not the best hike to take with flip flops. Probably better to hike in the latter afternoon when the morning dew evaporates. If the grasses are wet, you will be, too. Something to be said for long pants and a long shirt – maybe even some light gloves. After a few miles of walking through the grasses, your body gets a bit nicked up.

All in all, a very different experience from the geological drama of the cape.

GHOST FOREST

Five miles to the south of Pacific City is the smaller community of Neskowin.  Huddled up against the north base of the giant headland of Cascade Head, Neskowin features a gorgeous forest crowned monolith of its own, Proposal Rock.  Sited at the mouth of Neskowin Creek, a little wade brings you to the seastack where a 19^th century sea captain proposed to the daughter of a local homesteader. 

On the south side of the rock, revealed at low tide is the Ghost Forest.  Here stand stumps from trees drowned 1,800 years ago originally thought to be the result of a subduction created by a large earthquake.  The earthquake theory here is not quite as accepted as it once was.  The process may have been much more gradual with sands or saltwater killing the trees.  The stumps preserved then by sand.

Covered by sands, waves revealed the stumps at the end of the 20^th century.  The stumps are most visible during low winter and spring tides.  Sand covers many of the stumps during the summer months.  The trees were 300 years old at the time of the catastrophe. 

The Ghost Forest of Neskowin is not the only part of the Oregon Coast where such a phenomenon occurs, but it is the best known.  A grove of red cedars along the Copalis River just north of Grays Harbor along the central Washington Coast is another well-known example of a ghost forest.  Here, the tree remains stand from a later event, around 1700.  A giant earthquake in Japan set off a tsunami wall inundating the trees.

FAVORITE?

Again, what is your favorite part of the Oregon Coast?  Probably the place you most recently visited.