Beaching The Pacific

Last weekend marked one of the nicest weekends Portland has seen in awhile. To continue from my previous post, I thought I should share with you multiple photos of our Pacific Northwest beaching. The coast is about an hour and a half away from downtown Portland when taking US-26/Sunset Highway. Even the drive itself is beautiful. The trees are tall and endless, and the high rolling hills make for some pretty amazing outlines in the sky as you drive.

We were heading to the coast to meet up with Eric, Don, and Erika, to get some much needed Vitamin D and to watch Eric and Don surf :) Our destination: Smuggler's Cove; or as the local's call it, "Short Sands". Since Shannon and I really only know 'the locals', we tried our best to find the local name on the map to meet our friends...we found out that name doesn't exist on the map. Fortunately, because Shannon and I were so confused on the directions and ended up getting turned around once or twice, we stumbled upon this viewpoint alongside of a mountain and just had to stop. It was probably our greatest mistake of the day.

Driving along the US-101

After speaking with this (of course incredibly friendly) lady who had also stopped at the viewpoint, she directed us back towards where we needed to be. We were only a short distance away! After finding our parking spot and gathering our things from the car, we started the trek to the beach. As it turned out, we had yet another 10 minutes of walking with our towels, food, beer cooler, sunscreen, books, magazines, iPhones, and sunglasses until we actually reached the beach. The trail brought us through some beautiful forestry along a creek that emptied right into the Pacific Ocean. 

Don't worry, these shoulders are tan now ;)

Don, Shannon's and Eric's neighbor, was teaching Eric how to surf. Erika, Don's fiance and also their neighbor, was teaching Shannon and I how to properly apply sunscreen with an SPF of 45 as opposed to allowing us to use our SPF 15 that she and I purchased that morning. Of course Erika, being an aesthitician, had no problem sneaking in and slathering some proper SPF on our backs when we were laying out. After a few rotations in the sun (rotating every 20 minutes for nice, even tan) we decided to see how Eric was coming with his surf-training...we found out that for his first day, he has a promising surfing future. The person standing in the water is Don, and you'll see Eric do a quick attempt to stand up on his board. 

In our walk down to the other end of the beach to see Eric, of course a waterfall became visible. Since I have moved here I often find myself asking, "Why wouldn't there be a natural waterfall here?" Because this is Oregon, and it's what I am coming to expect :)

After we exhausted our time at Short Sands it was time to head north 20 minutes and hit up Cannon Beach. Cannon Beach has a ton of little shops along the coast, and it's what you would expect to find in any touristy beach area. I found that the gifts were not as kichy, and the stores actually had some quality items for purchase in comparison to most other beach towns. There are lots of little shops, galleries, and food venues. I will definitely be bringing anyone here that comes for a visit. Check out the shops and beach photos here. This beach is where the famous Haystack Rock lives. It's pretty much always amazing and I can't imagine ever getting sick of seeing it. For all of you Goonie's fans, this rock was actually in the opening scene when the Fratellies are fleeing from the police and then enter a race on the beach - the rock is in the background. It's also shown again later in the movie in the distance. 

Our own movie crew: Shannon, Eric, Don, and Erika

Don, Erika, and Eric had been out and about since 7:30am because they needed to get to the coast early to get the good surf boards and beat the traffic. It was the first amazing weekend, and it was in the 70s with no humidity or clouds - could have been a busy disaster. At this point in our day, it's probably around 6:00pm so Don and Erika headed home while Shannon, Eric, and I stayed for some overly greasy pizza and to wach the sunset. The sunset's along the coast are basically unbeatable. Where else are you going to find an uninterrupted view of the sun going down, other than the west coast?

Shannon

Eric

Me

Going...

...going...  

...gone.

And then we left. A 12 hour beach-day allowed us great sun, great tans, and great company. Can't wait to see what's in store for this coming weekend. Have a great few days!