We awoke to a couple of crazy kids ready for the day's adventure. They so enjoyed the hotel room, but now we were going to take them away from that tranquility and make them go camping. This is not something that we had done often with our children which is strange because we both enjoyed the outdoors so much. Being park rangers, I often had my fill of being outside and did not need another escape on my weekends. As teachers, our weekends were often taken up with grading and planning. So Spring Break was the time to get this done. We drove up 101 which from Crescent City, CA put us back in the state of Oregon pretty quickly.
We really enjoyed this drive which bounced back and forth between beautiful beaches and coastal forests. We stopped in the town of Gold Beach at the Ranger Station to pick up brochures about places that we could visit again in the future. The real goal was to find a place to camp for the evening and that put us around lunch time at Cape Blanco State Park. The weather was absolutely perfect out in the low 60s. It was sunny and not windy, which for Cape Blanco was supposedly rather odd. We enjoyed it and easily found a wooded campsite with lovely green grass to camp upon. Jacqueline got the kids some lunch while I took on the business of setting up tents, sleeping bags, and making everything comfortable.
The kids were really excited and it made camping so much more fun with them being happy to do it. We saw that Cape Blanco had some cabins and thought about how cool it would be to come back in the future and stay at those cabins. We took our time but, by 2 pm we were finding our way down to the beach. We walked down a long road that dropped steeply down to the beach. When we got there, it felt as if we had the place to ourselves. Oregon beaches are quite amazing because there are so many choices that they often are not very crowded. Cape Blanco is the furthest place west in the contiguous United States which is why the winds are so intense, but today there was nothing to complain about.
We had our own private beach to enjoy, so we set out toward the big cliffs on the other side of the beach. Everyone was in good spirits and the kids did well even on the long walk. Once we got to the end, there was nowhere left to go, so we sat down and the kids played in the sand for a while drawing stick figures and mini castles. There was a big jutting rock that made the coastline seem more rugged and I could only imagine just how nasty the waves and weather could be here during a storm. When we had our fill, we made our way back to our campsite for the evening. There were bunnies all around for Jacqueline and the kids to get excited about every time one hopped into our campsite.
We spent most of the evening playing games as the kids helped me strategize on how to beat Jacqueline at Catan. The sunset was semi- good, but also hard to see. The cool ocean air and just the relaxed feel of the campsite made me feel as if I could be here a long time. Unfortunately, though after an early bed time with children, we departed the next day after enjoying breakfast in camp. It was sad for me because I could have enjoyed it much longer. Instead we went into Bandon to do the tourist thing for a while before finally deciding to camp for the night near Florence. It was not nearly as ideal as spending the time at Cape Blanco, but we were able to make it out to the Sea Lion Caves the next day, which was an exciting experience for the kids.
I couldn't believe how many were there and how easy the access was to see them. The noise was overwhelming as well as the smell, but it was a fun experience. Sadly, though this was going to be the end of our short Spring Break trip. It was a fun family vacation and our kids did a lot considering their age. It made me excited for further adventures in the summer time as every month they seemed to be capable of so much more.
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