Oregon Coast things to do

What we did on the coast was…basically everything we did last time on the coast. Plus a few new things we found. We wanted to show Sam's parents this cool cedar tree and wetlands in Rockaway Beach (directions are here. Don't be confused and go into someone's driveway. The trail doesn't really look like a trail right at first, but you go into the wooded spot directly at the end of the street, and as soon as you get around the first tree you can see the trail.)

Such big leaves! Teddy did NOT want to sit here on this log by the big leaf.

But Daisy didn't mind! (Hi, Grandpa's arm!)

Tiny cedar cones!

And here's that huge cedar tree. This picture doesn't really show how big it is. Abe and Theodore look very…bright together, don't they?

Some other stuff we liked along the coast…this mama deer and her babies trotting along the road.

Big blimp hangar that is also an air museum. We heard that it was getting all cleared out of its aircraft and wasn't as good anymore, so we didn't go in. But it's a cool huge building! It appears to be just like the ones near my brother's house in Tustin, California. The insides are cool wood truss structures.

We went on a short little walk to Munson Creek Falls, south of Tillamook. Just the drive through the forest getting there is pretty—it reminds me of driving through the redwoods, but with smaller trees. You can't get right up next to the waterfall, but you get some great views of it from the trail.

I think this is the tallest waterfall in Oregon, besides Multnomah Falls.

The furry mossy trees look so soft and funny. Like furry men with too many arms.

I love this! Wildflowers growing ON moss…ON a fallen tree!

You can see that big mess of tree trunks that has fallen and landed on the ledge in the middle of the waterfall. It looks so precarious! I can't believe the trees are staying there. The ledge must be bigger and flatter than it seems (or else the trees are being swept down frequently).

It's just a short 5- or 10-minute hike to where the trail ends and you can look at the falls. We thought it was worth the stop!

Another activity we repeated from our previous visit was riding the steam train between Rockaway Beach and Garibaldi. It's expensive, but we like trains! I just wish it went even farther along the coast.

Goldie and Grandpa. Goldie was so small last time we rode this train, she barely even had hair!

I love the little lakes and ponds everywhere. This one was covered with yellow water lilies!

The misty cloudy look in these pictures is making me "homesick" for Oregon. It's so hot here at home! And it was so nice and cool and comfortable there!

There's a playground in Garibaldi you can play on while you wait for the return trip to start. Malachi is being…a mummy, I think?

This was what Sebastian looked like for nearly the entire trip. Watching the locomotive with great intensity. He loves seeing how things work.

These little jackets went with us on our earlier trip, too…with two different people in them.

Another good stop along the coast is the Cape Meares lighthouse. Grandma and Grandpa Nielson went here without us one day, and told us about it, so we stopped there a different day. We saw signs for something called the "octopus tree," and all of a sudden it seemed so familiar. Sam and I finally realized that we had stopped here on our way up the Oregon coast even longer ago—on a trip we took to Oregon without the kids just after we got married (the second time). It was really weird to have those memories, where everything was new and foreign, suddenly come into focus and merge with this place we were already semi-familiar with. I could almost remember exactly how it felt back then, sitting in our rental car and deciding whether to make the stop, and the way I was feeling at the time. Strange.

But, here we are! All these years later.

Daisy and Junie by the Octopus Tree. It doesn't actually have eight arms. Maybe it used to? These girls have a weird little chanting song they made up a long time ago which says "Octopus! Octopus!," so it seemed right that they make a pilgrimage here.

This tree seems pretty octopus-ish too, but it is not THE OCTOPUS TREE.

Teddy was intrigued by a little curly millipede on the trail.

I believe these are the three arches referenced in "Three Arch Rocks National Wildlife Refuge." They don't all look like arches from most angles. But I can almost see them all here.

This was cool, I thought. Look down at the edge of the cliff, next to the ocean. Every time a wave came up on the top part of that outcropping,

it spilled over and made a little waterfall! See it there, cascading down? I couldn't stop watching it. It appeared and disappeared with each big wave.

Here's the top of the lighthouse. I love it.