After we woke up in Seaside, OR we went to a charming little breakfast place (I think it was called Auntie M's or something like that) where Ryan got a muffin but I got a delicious ham, egg & cheese breakfast sandwich on a croissant. Unfortunately, our sunny weather was gone...it was gray, cold, foggy and drizzling. We didn't mind the drizzling and cold so much but the fog pretty much made any scenic viewpoint useless because all we could see was fog. Doh! We traveled south down highway 101 all the way down the coast, stopping to see a lighthouse and some tide pools. The tide pools were pretty neat because you could see star fish and such in them. There was also a sea lion on the beach and tons and tons of seagulls around.
At the end of the day, there was a partial solar eclipse. Thanks to the fog/mist we were able to see it without burning our eyes out. We didn't get a great pic but it's still pretty neat.
That night, we stayed in a charming little town called Florence which has a little historic downtown that kind of reminded me of Melbourne. We found a place to eat that was very popular with the locals and turned out to be delicious! The place looked like it used to be a house and only fit around 8-10 tables. The food was tasty and the prices were right - i got a crab encrusted grouper filet with a Caesar salad for $12. Also, interesting fact about Oregon...NO SALES TAX! We didn't even notice at first but when we got our check for dinner I realized how cheap it was and then how nice it was to not have to add tax in.
The next morning (Monday), we got to go to the Sea Lion Caves. Apparently, there are hundreds or maybe even thousands of Stellar Sea Lions that take refuge in this gigantic cave. During the winter they live in the cave and then in the summer they go outside on the rocks to mate and give birth. It was pretty darn cold and yucky weather Monday so we were taking pics as quickly as we could but I'm still glad we got to see them! Some of them are 12' long and can weigh up to 1500lbs...crazy!
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There were even more sea lions in the water that were trying to get up onto the rocks. The waves were so strong and it was making them crash into the rock - it looked exhausting for the poor sea lions. Especially one baby one and one huge fat one. Eventually a big wave carried the little one up but the fatty was still having trouble. After about ten minutes the big one finally got up and was baying his excitement at being on the rock. It was also neat to see some of the other ones hurtle themselves off of the rock and into the surf - I'm not sure why they would want to since the others were having such a hard time getting up, lol!
Pretty much the entire day was cold, rainy and windy so we didn't get very many other good pictures. At most of the viewpoints, all we could see was fog - we couldn't see any trees or the water or anything...dreary :(
Pretty much the entire day was cold, rainy and windy so we didn't get very many other good pictures. At most of the viewpoints, all we could see was fog - we couldn't see any trees or the water or anything...dreary :(
Since we didn't get out of the car much, we were getting pretty bored. Towards the end of the day, there was a spot we were originally going to hike at but it was still very miserable weather. We decided to try it out anyways, with the hopes that maybe the trees would shelter us from the wind and rain. We were right - it was pretty nice under the trees! Occasionally the wind would blow and cause the trees to drop tons of big water droplets on our heads but overall we weren't too cold. We ended up hiking up 2.5 miles with an elevation increase of 1800ft (and then hiked the 2.5mi back down); it was exhausting! And of course we were terrible hikers - we were wearing worn out tennis shoes, had no water or snacks, no map/compass/light, lol...if we had gotten lost we would have had a hard time. But we didn't, it was a great hike - even though when we got to the summit of the mtn there was no view :( Well there probably was a view but we couldn't see it through the fog. Oh well, it was still nice to get out of the car for a bit. By the time we got back down the mountain we didn't mind relaxing in the car for some more driving.
We finished our trek through Oregon and entered Califorina!
We finished our trek through Oregon and entered Califorina!
