Coos Bay - Part 4

Traveling with three labs in a travel trailer can elicit a lot of funny looks,  people looking at you like you might just be nuts.  Maybe we are nuts, but we have found that the best way to travel with three crazy dogs, is to travel with tired dogs.  In order to do this, you have to find fun places to go that they can also go, and where they can run around freely.  You will NEVER tire dogs like ours out on leash walks, trust me, Ive tried.  It does not work..  You end up spending a lot of time at beaches, empty beaches are the best, or hiking around for hours at a time.  We've been very fortunate to be able to find such beaches along our journey, and some of my favorites that I have found have been here in the Coos Bay area.  I have talked about the 7 Devils area a few times,  I do love this beach, it stretches for miles both north and south of the parking area, making it an easy place to get out and wander without too many others around.. I was discussing this with one of my neighbors here in the RV park, and the had mentioned that while 7 Devils is nice, they are bigger fans of the Whiskey Run beach, south of 7 Devils.

After my covered bridge tour, I knew that I would need to do something fun with the pups because they had spent most of the previous day cooped up in their kennels. A beach day was in store for us.  I got up early and headed down to Bandon, it was a rainy day, and I figured it would be a good day to go explore the beach near Face Rock before all the people showed up.  In theory, going early and trying to be on the beach by 8 would be an excellent idea, in reality it didn't work.  Apparently the people of Bandon like to get out to the beach early.  When we showed up at 8 the beach was already flooded with plenty of tourists wandering around Face Rock, which was a bummer because there is a fun sea cave that would have been fun to check out, but it would be a nightmare with three dogs attached to you. The beach to the south of Face Rock was empty tho, so we would still be able to wander around quite a bit.  On our way down to the beach Buddy happened to find a tennis ball, how Frank didn't notice it I have no idea, usually he is all about the ball.  Since Buddy found it first, he picked it up and carried it around like a treasure. He had no desire to play fetch, he wanted nothing more than to carry it.  Silly dog.  We wandered around this area for about 30 minutes before the masses of people started showing up, and I knew that we would need to move on to find a different beach.  I decided that today would be a good day to check out Whiskey Run, if it was anything like 7 Devils, odds were good that it would be empty today.

We pulled into the parking area and found that it was indeed empty. You can drive on the beach in this area, but I have not yet done that.  With my luck I would end up getting the truck stuck in the sand or something and I really don't think I should be taking those types of chances.  We set out toward the water, and notice that there was also a fresh water stream running into the ocean here, which is wonderful to have after playing in the salt water.  I would have the opportunity to rinse them off before putting them back in their kennels. 

When we left the beach in Bandon, I made Buddy leave the tennis ball there for another dog to enjoy. Plus I am not a huge fan of them chewing on tennis balls, they are like chewing on sand paper and terrible for their teeth, and I'm sure even worse when actually covered in sand.  But not to fret, when Buddy decides he wants to carry a treasure, he will always find something.  It only took about 5 minutes at Whiskey Run for him to find his next one,  a giant stick.  This dog is hilarious, he always dreams big, and usually picks the biggest stick that he can carry, much like he did today. He's funny too, because he doesn't always want to play fetch, he just wants to carry something.  And he did, he carried that giant stick for about 45 minutes all around the beach.  It had to hurt his poor jaw.  Luckily after 45 minutes, Frank finally noticed that he had a treasure and decided that he needed to try to take it from him.  Normally this is something that I frown upon, but today he happened to break the stick in half, and they were both content that they each had their own treasure.  The smaller stick was much easier for Mr Buddy to carry too, so he didn't seem too upset that Frank stole the other half.. We spent almost 2 hours just wandering around the beach, which was sufficient to thoroughly wear them out for the rest of the day.  

The next best way to wear them out is hiking.  I enjoy hiking, especially when there are waterfalls involved.  Luckily there are plenty of waterfalls in this area, as long as you are willing to go find them.  I had found a trail with waterfalls called Sweet Creek Falls, which is about an hour away, which seems to be the norm for the distance of my day trips.  I was talking with my older sister on the drive up to the trailhead, and laughing because I was once again driving to go hike somewhere, and I honestly had no idea how long of a hike this would be.  I could drive an hour there and get out and walk a total of 200 yards before reaching the end of the trail, or i could end up hiking for 10 miles. I feel like this kind of mystery makes it that much more fun.  Luckily the Sweet Creek falls trail ended up being a perfect hike! It was about a 3 mile loop that took us about two hours to finish, and there were SEVERAL waterfalls along the way.  YAY!! I was fortunate enough to get there early and be able to beat the crowds, which means the dogs would get to run around off leash.  Even better!

The hike was a really easy hike, and the only reason that it took us as long as it did was because I felt the need to stop at every waterfall and take pictures.  It was beautiful, some of the waterfalls are only 3 feet tall, but others were about 20 feet tall and had giant swimming holes at the base of them, if you would ever be crazy enough to try to swim in that cold of water anyway.  They were perfect for the pups tho.  The end of the trail leads to the biggest waterfall and swimming area.  Once we reached this point we just sat there an admired the view for about 15 minutes.  In the time that we were sitting there, we were joined by a family of hikers from Nevada.  I did not have the pups on leash at this point, so I was frantically trying to get them back on leash but they seemed just as happy to see the dogs and the dogs were to see them, and asked if they could pet them. It was perfect. Frank immediately took a liking to the younger boy and was following him around on the rocks, where as Buddy seemed to like the older boy.  The older boy wasn't so sure what to think of the pups and seemed much more standoffish than his younger brother.  He was sitting on a rock that had a tree abutting it, and Buddy was standing there just staring at him wagging his tail. The kid was funny, at one point he looked at me and asked why he was doing that.  Then I noticed that there was an old broken branch sticking off the tree on top of the rock, that Buddy thought was a stick, and he wanted the kid to throw it for him.  Since the stick was still attached to the tree, the kid got up and went to find another stick to give to Buddy.  It was adorable.  His mom just looked at me and had the biggest smile on her face.  Apparently her son was allergic to some dogs, and in turn has always kind of been afraid of them. This was the first time that she had ever seen her son try to play with a dog, she was so happy. They have been wanting a dog for a long time but never got one because she didn't know if he would do ok with one.  It made my heart smile to know that Buddy was gentle enough for this kid to actually want to be around him.

After visiting with the family for a few minutes we took another trail, not as worn trail up the hill a little further.  I kept the pups off leash for this then I got a little freaked out at the end of it because it came to a dead end on the top of the boulders, where the falls began, and there was nothing but a free fall for about 50 feet to the swimming hole below.  So I made the pups all sit while I ventured out to the top of the rocks to take pictures ;)

We worked our way back down toward the truck, and I started thinking that I am so grateful we started as early as we did, because while we only saw for other people on the way in, we passed several groups of people on the way out, once again I had timed it perfect.  When we got back to the truck the pups were so tired.  The boys willingly jumped into the truck just so they could lay down in their kennels, but Trigger is different when she is tired.  She will just sit there and stare at you, and will NOT jump in to the truck.  I takes some serious persuading to get her in there.

After getting her in the truck I started back down the road toward Mapleton, then to Florence before I could head back south to Reedsport.  Before I reached the highway though I saw a sign that read "Reedsport 37", meaning that the road would go south from the trailhead.  I thought about it for a second, and decided to give it a try.  I love back roads.  Plus we were the ONLY vehicle up there. This road took me up a paved road for about 5 miles further, then turned into a one lane dirt road that meandered through the mountains.  It was stunning up there. We were actually high enough to be able to look out and see three ridges over.  This is not a common occurrence here in Oregon. Usually the trees are so thick that you can't see in the distance at all.  Plus there were several little waterfalls along the side of the road, and wild flowers everywhere.  I love driving on roads like this.  It eventually led to a road along the Smith River, and then would head back into Reedsport.

When I wear the pups out this much,  I like to take opportunities to go do something they can't.  Like visit lighthouses.  I am trying to make it a mission to see all of the lighthouses in Oregon.  Today was the perfect day to hit the Umpqua River lighthouse outside of Winchester Bay.  This lighthouse was the second one on this site, the first one was built in 1857, but succumbed to erosion in 1861.  This one was built and let out its first light in 1894, and emits a distinctive red-and-white automated flashes.  This is the first light house that I have been to that was actually fenced off so I couldn't walk around it much,  but it was still fun to see, plus the view from the grounds were beautiful.  It overlooked the Oregon Dunes and the rock spits in the ocean beyond the dunes.  I met and adorable old couple here while I was admiring. They were on their way home from the hospital after the wife had been discharged, but she decided that she wanted to come here as their first stop.  She loves nothing more than sitting there staring at the ocean.  She told me that on one of her visits here she witnessed whales playing around just beyond the spit. She sat there for three hours just watching them, prompting her husband to go in to a panic thinking she was dead in a ditch somewhere because she hadn't told him where she was headed.  It was adorable. 

After leaving the lighthouse I decided to go down to check out the South Jetty in the dunes.  It was a beautiful day and the beach was calling my name.  The pups were still pretty tired, but they seem to always find energy to go to the ocean.  I think they love it as much as I do.  When we reached a spot where we were away from the crowds, I let them free to run.  Buddy once again found a giant stick that he wanted, but today he didn't want to just carry it, he wanted to play some fetch.  It is impossible to just play fetch with Buddy, so we had to break the stick again and give each one of the boys their own stick.  Then just to keep Trigger from eating everything on the beach I found one for her too.  I took turns throwing the stick for each one of them for a little while before I forced them to take a break. So I found a nice spot in the sand and had a seat for a while.  I had to hide the stick from them, or else they would continue to run until they collapsed.  As we were sitting there Frank could barely keep his eyes open, but you could tell that he wanted nothing more than for me to throw the stick again.  He is such a funny dog.  It was honestly the warmest, sunniest day on the beach that we have had this entire journey, I wanted to make it last as long as possible.

After leaving the beach I drove into Winchester Bay, admired the harbor for a minute,  then went and got an ice cream cone at BJ's ice cream.  It was the perfect end to a perfect day.

I was fortunate that I was able to wear them out enough that they were pretty much out the entire next day too.  Jackpot! That means that I have more time to just bum around and do something I've never done before.  I decided to go to the movie, by myself.  I have never done that in all of my 34 years.  Not that I mind doing things on my own, I just haven't ever done it.  I love sappy romance movies, and know that they are not always Kyle's cup of tea, so it was a perfect opportunity to go see the movie "Me, Before You" I got there a little late so I missed the previews, but as i went in to the dark theater I noticed something else that was a first for me.  I WAS THE ONLY PERSON IN THERE!! I was fantastic! I picked a spot right in the middle of the theater, put my feet up, and didn't worry about if I was chewing my popcorn too loudly or not. I could laugh as loud as I wanted, or cry like a baby and NO ONE would see it! It was the best movie experience ever!