We hit the road again heading north on Hwy 101. Our first stop today was Sunset Bay. It was a beautiful area, although cloudy this morning, but it would be a great place to watch the sunset.
Nearby in the same area we found the Shore Acres State Park lookouts. This area had beautiful rocky shoreline.
We stopped for lunch in Coos Bay nearby at the Blue Heron Bistro. It was eclectic mix of German food and seafood. We all opted for the German food. It was pretty authentic. I had goulash soup, Dustin splurged on Glousah and spätzle, and I had sauerkraut and a bratwurst. So good!
After lunch we headed to the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area. It was so cool, it felt like we were in the dessert! We hiked about 1 mile to the beach.
The beach was the closest thing I’ve seen out here that looks like an east coast beach!
Dustin and I headed on to do the 4.5 mile loop…unfortunately it turned into over 5.5 miles because somehow we got off track. It was a little bit scary because we were in brush areas and saw lots of animal tracks. Praise the Lord we did not encounter any cougars or other animals! We were lost (well we knew were we were on the map/GPS worked) but didn’t know how to get back to the trail for over 30 minutes. Sarah and Josh had just turned back from the beach and headed to the car so they were there waiting on us. We stood there and prayed that God would show us the trail and a few minutes later Dustin saw the posts that were marking the trail off in the distance. Hallelujah! We were back on the trail in a few minutes. It was a very different terrain, and very difficult to hike as the sand poured into our shoes. Neat to see…but we probably won’t be doing this again!
Dustin and I were covered in Sand, he didn’t empty his shoes the whole time, here is his picture of the amount of sand he collected.
Afterwards we rinsed off and hit the road to Eugene. We grabbed dinner at an AMAZING Thai place, all of us agree this is the best Thai food we’ve ever had at Ta Ra Rin Thai Cuisine. I had a fish curry dish and Dustin a peanut prawn dish. That’s all for today’s adventures. Headed to Crater Lake tomorrow!
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