Remote Beach

Last night Tom, Angie, Dave and I had some great conversations around dinner. We were the only people in the Hiker/Biker camp area so we all sat around a picnic table and chatted. Dave is 60 and is a low key triple crowner (PCT, CDT, AT) as well as many other trails. Tom and Angie are Millennials and are professional river guides. This is their first long trail. 

This morning I got packed up early and then walked the 2.5 miles down to Bandon. I stopped at Bandon Coffee Cafe and grabbed a Java, breakfast sandwich , and sat at a table outside. Started up a conversation with Jim, a local who is section hiking the Oregon Coast. Not exactly the OCT, but the actual coast. In some places he said he’s had to scale rocks and cliffs to get around points and capes. Jim looks and moves like he’s in his early sixties, but he told me he was 81! I can only hope to be that spry in 8 years.

We bid farewell and I headed to the Bandon Beach. Famous for all the haystack rocks right off shore, it was quite picturesque. I saw Dave checking out some of the formations. But it was down the beach with me. I had an appointment with New River about 4.5 miles down the beach. Yet another low tide ford.

New River is interesting because it parallels the beach for over ten miles just a couple hundred yards inland. So when you cross the mouth you are on a 10+ mile long spit. Another peculiar thing is that the sand along that spit is coarser, more like kitty litter which makes it less firm for walking. Even the wet sand there gives with every step. Very exhausting to walk on, or should I say in, as you sink with every step.

Well, the crossing was not very exciting and only ankle deep. I found out later why. A few miles down from the mouth of the river was a second mouth I had to ford. This one only calf deep. So the river was draining from two places and splitting the outflow.

Right after that I encountered a lone sea lion hanging out on the beach. The New River effectively cuts off access to this whole strip of beach, making it more remote than one might think. The sea lion seemed surprised to see me.

Eleven miles in to this beach I was flagging. The effort of walking in the kitty litter sand was wearing me down. Fortunately I was just passing the BLM campsite for OCT hikers. Located behind the foredune on the New River spit, it provided relief from the wind and some makeshift driftwood furniture to sit on. I stopped and had lunch sitting on kind of a driftwood couch. My umbrella provided shade, and I got recharged for the next 10 miles. It was with some reluctance that I left the BLM site and returned to trek down nthe beach.

I finally left the kitty litter beach after another 8.5 miles and started up Blacklock Point. This tree covered part of Cape Blanco is a refreshing change and my stealth camp for tonight. I am tucked into a nice sheltered area in kind of a ravine on the headland.

Tomorrow I have two rivers to ford and then I head into Port Orford and a motel. I will zero the day after that and Nancy will be meeting me accompanied by Cappuccino who will be joining me for the next leg of my trip.

Happy Trails…