Cape Lookout : Day Two

We already posted a bit about the hike we did on the second day of our stay, but after we got back to the cabin it was still early and we couldn't stay cooped up indoors when we had 50 degree temperatures outside! So we went for a long walk down the beach. I discovered that my digital camera actually does black and white fairly decently, so even though the film camera that I brought along turned out to have a dead battery (rookie mistake!), I'm pretty happy with how the digital black and white turned out. Here are a few from the hike that I took in black and white - - 

It's funny, because I wouldn't think that black and white would be ideal for taking photos of a super green forest, but some of these photos actually capture the atmosphere better than the color photographs I took. Sometimes, color is overwhelming! I guess that's why you start out taking black and white photography classes and drawing and painting in black and white. It's easier to see the details of the forest when you aren't distracted by all of its colors. Anyway, on to the beach photos (color and b&w) - -

The beach stretches almost as far as you can see - the park has a long spit that shelters a bay - it's in our hiking book, but it was marked as "difficult", and since we'd just done a hike we figured we'd just walk down it until we got tired and then head back. We were lucky with the tides, and there was a lot of flat, hard sand to walk on. 

We returned on what we thought was the campground trail but what turned out to be a service road (oops). We did get a nice view of the campgrounds, though, and even picked out the spots we think might be best when we come back in the summer! The tent sites are even closer to the beach than our cabin was. 

Another fire to end another lovely day - a tiring day, but a good kind of tired! 
One last picture, one that shows something I didn't even know happened until we moved here - - 

In Oregon (and all over the PNW), trees grow out of other trees!

Hike : Cape Lookout

On day two of our Cape Lookout stay, we decided to do the aptly named Cape Lookout trail - a trail that goes all the way to the end of the cape in the picture above. Although you can begin this hike from our cabin, walking all the way up to the top of the cape, we didn't - the trail was closed for some reason. Instead, we drove two miles to the trailhead and started out from the top.

The trail was really nice - it ran along the edge of the cape for a while, then curved into the forested interior, then came out near the other side for a while, went back into the woods, came out again. Even though the trail was pretty muddy, it was obviously well-used - there were lots of footprints (human and dog!) even though we only passed a few hikers on the way in. 

The views from the hike were beautiful - we were a few hundred feet in the air and could see familiar landmarks far to the north and south.  The halfway point of our hike was the tip of the cape, where there was a bench set up with a view out to sea. We had a snack, took a few pictures, and left when it started to drizzle.

All the way back, it was slightly drizzling but we saw a lot more hikers going out to stake claim on the lone bench. According to our hiking book, this trail is really popular in the summer. Personally, I think we picked a perfect day!

It was extra special because we saw a bunch of trillium flowers, a wildflower that grows all over Oregon and blooms in spring. They're so pretty in their simplicity - and it's illegal to pick them because they take seven years to bloom again after being cut! We were happy to see that spring was on its way in late February. Here's our hike, plotted on a map:

Cape Lookout : Day One

After we saw one of the cabins at Cape Lookout State Park on the cover of Portland Monthly last year and it looked amazing, we knew we had to visit. We booked our cabin around the first of the year for the end of February and wondered if anyone else would be at the other cabins, or if we were the only crazy people to book a cabin at the coast in February. Well, all of the cabins were full - and they're now all booked up through September! We were ready to rebook ours the minute we got home, but apparently we aren't the only ones who appreciate a cheap cabin with a view of the Pacific Ocean.

We drove in through Tillamook, land of cows and delicious cheese, and headed out to Cape Lookout. It's only a little over an hour and a half from Portland, so even though we left kind of late in the day it didn't matter at all.

We were so happy when we saw our cabin - it was perfect! Look at it, all nestled in the fir trees - it looks like it should be on the cover of a magazine. The view from it was just as good - the ocean was just down a hill, a few hundred feet away.

We expected the whole trip to be rainy and grey and damp but instead it started off with a clear sunset and warm weather (50+). After watching the sunset, we headed back up to the cabin to unpack and build a fire. Last October, we went to Silver Falls State Park and stayed in a "rustic" cabin there - no private bathroom or kitchen. This cabin was "deluxe" - we had a bathroom, a kitchenette with microwave, and a TV with DVD player! (No TV service, but still.) The deluxe cabin beds with their weird plastic mattresses weren't any more comfortable than the rustic ones (note to self: bring a sleeping pad next time), but the fridge came in handy! We're sad that we can't book it again for sometime in the summer, because it'll be even more perfect in the summer, but there's always next year (and tent camping)!