The encroaching morning began to overwhelm the incredible cozy factor that wrapped us in blissful sleep in our yurt. With the awareness that sunrise might be rare over these days, we peel out of our toasty zone to venture into the beauty zone.

We have made it outside before the sun pokes over the horizon not only due to the science of how morning light spilling into sleeping spaces typically wakes people but also due to the biological process that alerts you that you’ve held your water long enough. On our short walk to the loo facilities, we saw what we couldn’t during our arrival in the evening and what we had conveniently forgotten in order that novelty would once again play its hand: we are mere steps away from the ocean.

How we missed this Rockaway Beach Trail on one of the many previous visits to Harris Beach State Park might be described as a mystery, but when the eyes dart about faster than the sense that searches for luxury, we find ourselves at the place of instant gratification. I’ll explain how that works as we approach the end of this walk. From the cliffside, the trail led us to this narrow path sliced between rocks that would have otherwise been difficult to access. Thank you to the mole people who carved this narrow passage that enchanted us with an opportunity to slither through.

Before reaching the point where we practiced our snake routine, we nearly fell into regret at the lack of foresight to bring the binoculars or zoom lens with us just as some river otters went scampering across the beach before disappearing into the rocks we were about to walk over. We were just too far away for a worthy photo, so instead of finding regret, we recognized how amazing everything can be when our will is able to propel us out of routines, even when sacrifices have to be made to experience the extraordinary or things turn out less perfect than planned.

And so we walk forward instead of rushing back for what was forgotten as the evolving light of the early morning will not wait on us. With sunlight starting to be captured by the waves, molten splashes of daytime fireworks jump above the rocks they crash into, and we are reassured that our decision was sound. With the rising mist glowing in golden-orange light peaking around the corner of a particularly large rock, I gawk in awe, wondering how far this sight can extend into the realm of magnificence.

Ah yes, our tiny castle by the sea with every bit of splendor the Wises look for when going coastal. While we lack television, wifi, room service, a toilet, shower, microwave, sheets, blankets, running water, and a breakfast buffet, our yurt features a sense of opulence found when the two of us walk through that door, and the place takes on inexplicable qualities that likely can only occur when those passing the threshold are truly in love. Yep, that must be it.

Now full of romance and sunshine, it was time to fill up equally on breakfast. Our meal at Mattie’s Pancake House might have turned out ordinary if it weren’t for the second Sun of the day rising over our table in the form of Peggy. She’s a waitress in the classical sense, where people with such jobs used to understand something more about customer service and engagement. One is not fully served by Peggy if one refuses to acknowledge the rarity of being offered time to engage in banter. In exchange for the playful back and forth, we were offered a tip on a small, infrequently visited beach just up the road and a look at this vintage postcard of Mattie’s Pancake House that recently came into their possession.

Here we are at Mill Beach in Bandon, Oregon, with gratitude being sent Peggy’s way for the tip. This is also where my notes for the day took a break until the final glimmer of light danced over the sands and sea during sunset many hours from now. What follows are the musings of memories, impressions, desires, and the necessity of fingers representing a mind to record things that will allow Caroline and me to revisit this place in our days ahead and possibly inspire someone else to follow in our footsteps or craft their own journey that takes them to previously unknown places.

Hmm…a new configuration of rocks, water, and sky. This can only mean one thing: we must up our vigilance to ensure nothing gets by our keenly tuned senses that are looking for what’s out of place and especially for what’s in its rightful place.

Splashy water, check.

Smiling hagfish on the beach, check.

Alrighty then, this beach has my seal of approval. Yep, I went there.

We stand on the seashore under the warmth of a sun that sits 93 million miles away while our planet zips around that sun at 67,000 miles per hour and don’t forget that our entire solar system is racing around the galactic center at 490,000 miles per hour which equates to 136 miles per second or 219 kilometers per hour. What this means is that we are hauling ass even when standing still and contemplating what sets this scene apart from one seen yesterday. Looking these numbers up, I come to realize that if we spent only 15 minutes at this beach, we’d have moved 122,500 miles through space, which is the same as circumnavigating Earth almost five times. I swear I’m not stoned (high) as I write this stuff, but as one thing leads to another, over the course of a lifetime, we’ll have traveled 340 billion miles through the vastness of space or for a way to better understand such big numbers, you make 1,823 roundtrip journeys between the sun and your home. I wanted to share how many roundtrips this would equal if it were to the moon, which would be 1,423,189 times, but then that number starts getting difficult to comprehend while 13.6 million trips around our own planet wouldn’t even allow one to see anything other than a blur.

If you got this far, my point is that even if we stand still, we are in motion, but then again, we are not unless we’ve engaged our senses to the changing world that hurtles forward in much the same way we are passing through time and when it comes down to it, 29,000 days in a lifetime is an ever so brief moment to be out here standing still before the ocean wondering why we’re so fortunate to contemplate abstractions.

Meanwhile, crazy hagfish lady performs an ancient Teutonic dance from her childhood to bring on the wind in order to fly her kite. Little does she care that just above our sky, the solar winds are blowing by at 1 million miles per hour; she should try flying her kite there.

So John, what big thoughts do you have on fern-lined paths through the forest? The mind swirls around fantasies of nymphs, imps, pixies, and gnomes, and no, I’ve not eaten a mushroom along the way. Regarding our location, we’ve left Mill Beach and traveled about a dozen miles north to hike the Arch Rock to Secret Beach Trail.

Is this really just the second day out here in Oregon? Oh yeah, time is dilating due to our awareness that we’ve already traveled 12.7 million miles around our galaxy. For those who travel far, we are presented with riches of experience that have no rival; for proof, just consider this moment in time that was captured by Caroline and me on our walk down this trail. We were the only ones out here, as evidenced by the lack of other cars in the parking lot, while the play of light and color with this exact configuration of elements will have only ever been witnessed by us. Why is that? Because we traveled far and invested in our potential for experience in order to gain just such moments of wonder. In a sense, this becomes the religious journey in much the same way others travel into the Bible, the Koran, the Rig Veda, or the Tripitaka, searching for moments that show them the truth. We find the visceral affirmation of life standing at the precipice of nature where the hand of man remains invisible.

Who doesn’t love shield lichen? Whoa, the rabbit hole that opens should you search for info about edible lichen offers things such as the tasty fact that the partially digested lichen eaten by caribou and harvested from their rumen is called stomach icecream while on a tastier side of things, lichen is used in various masalas of India and is said to impart an umami flavor to foods cooked with it.

I’ll wager you are smacking your lips together right about now, wondering what kind of culinary achievement you might whip up with a couple of tablespoons of these lichens.

Often, when I’m writing of these days after we’ve returned from vacation, I’ll listen to something in order to block the sound of the coffee shop I’ve taken up in and to set a mood that feels congruent with where I was mentally while walking in the environment. As I looked at this photo, I was wondering if there was a song that fit the sense I was feeling from it and that maybe it could kickstart this return to my narrative. I’m caught between two songs: the first is from Röyksopp, titled Lights Out, and the other is from Beach House, titled Space Song. Even before writing this, I also made consideration of songs from Rüfüs Du Sol, Odesza, and Ólafur Arnalds’ track So Far + So Close, meaning it’s taking a while to get these words going, but the music is nice. Needless to say, the trail was far better than any song, hence the difficulties in finding one that really hit the mark in my attempt to trigger a flow of descriptive words. If nothing else, I put a reminder here in a post that will refresh my memory about what I was listening to in late 2022.

I don’t believe I thought of this before, but in some ways, these photos are like the pop songs we were listening to on the days we were out on vacation. One-day wonder hits such as The Trees with On The Arch Rock Trail or DJ Peggy’s remix of Mill Beach, followed by Wet Feet performing I’ll Fly My Kite.

Somewhere nearby is the Kabouter, a mushroom sprite, just out of sight, maybe in the shadows, or is he hiding under the cap? Calling a Kabouter is futile as they appear when the magic of the moment suits them, and in any case, one should be careful around mushrooms as the treacherous Giftzwerg could be close at hand.

I may well be mistaken, but I’m going to guess this is Spruce Island. I know that we are close, and I know that there’s an official overlook, but we’re not at that signed overlook, and the other images I might compare to on search engines show me Arch Rock, so who knows?

This is the end of the trail for us as we just about reached Secret Beach. There was a hint of trail that continued down to the beach level, but my fear of exposure to precariously steep slivers of earth held me back. There was also the matter of needing to cross Miller Creek down there that I allowed to give me pause, and while we stood here well satisfied with our third walk of the day, now that I’m writing this, I do wish we’d gone all the way down to the beach to see the view from that perspective. On the bright side of regret, everything about this beautiful trail would invite us to a return visit, and what’s more, we have a solid reason to come back.

And this is the other part of the namesake that identifies this trail, Arch Rock. With so many years traveling this coast, I’m astonished that we could find three new places to visit today that we’d never been to in any of our previous adventures here on the western edge of Oregon. I can only wonder how many hidden gems still exist outside of our view that we are yet to experience if we are so lucky in the years to come to visit yet again. I can share with you that just writing that is an invitation to drop what I’m doing and start scouring maps and travel blogs to find what we’ve missed while dreaming of coming back next November.

There’s really nothing in this photo that hasn’t already been shown in the previous few images, but the shift of where we are on the trail has it looking brand new to us. That or we are reluctant to let go of such a delightful stroll and are trying to bring it all back with us.

The reassuring shark tooth/fin of Meyers Creek Beach. One of my all-time favorite images of this place was shot back in 2006 on a gray, blustery day; click here to take a look. Maybe I should explain why it’s reassuring. Down south in California at Garrapata State Park in Big Sur, we’ve watched the beach change in incredible ways where large disappearing rocks are somehow buried in shifting sands or they’ve been broken up and taken into deeper waters. Yet the shark tooth here in Oregon has become a homing beacon for us over the years. But John, aren’t you contradicting one of your basic tenets, and that is that you love change? Anyone who really knows me knows that I’m capable of contradicting almost everything I tell others I believe; such is the fluidity of being able to change my mind.

Lest we forget, this is the northern view of Meyers Creek Beach with Highway 101 on the right, so should you find yourself driving down the Oregon coast, you too will have the chance to view this favorite stop of ours, even if you should decide not to scramble over the boulders to reach the beach.

But you should make that scramble as the reflections down here seriously worthwhile.

And according to Caroline, the water is fine, maybe not for a swim but certainly for a late fall walk in the surf.

While I was ready to go, Caroline insisted that we at least make our way over to the back of the shark fin/tooth, and wouldn’t you know it that her intuition (I meant insatiable appetite to see it all) proved right as I nabbed yet another image I feel worthy of sharing. By the way, Caroline is standing on the left, and if you look closely, you can see her and better understand the scale of this giant rock. After I snapped this great silhouette with the sun just peeking up over the corner, Caroline was flailing her arms about crazily, and she didn’t even have her kite in her hands. She was probably hollering something, too, but who can hear anything over crashing waves?

As I approached she was pointing to the sea stars, anemones, and countless mussels and barnacles – score! You’d think my wife had found the leprechaun with a pot of gold due to her wild enthusiasm. I have no idea how many thousands of sea stars this woman has seen, and each time we encounter them in their natural habitat, her inner six-year-old is spirited back into existence as she lets her exuberance flow.

Maybe you think she’s any less excited by barnacles? You don’t know her. From the patterns, gradations of color, textures, and sharp edges, along with the clicking sounds they make as they move around in their shells, Caroline is right there studying these crustaceans, looking for a detail she might have overlooked on one of the other 412 encounters with these tidal dwellers. Come to think about it, and for the sake of honesty, I might have also been describing myself.

Okay, okay, Caroline, I’m almost done taking my 50 photos of these fascinating barnacles that are just begging to have their images shared on my blog; well, that’s how I am interpreting the clicking sounds.

The elevation change should be the first giveaway that we’ve left the tide pool and are continuing our trek; northward we go as tonight’s lodging is to be found up a ways.

These two images are similar, but the first one is not a crop of the wider view; they are a reminder to not just give a glance and move on but always try to see more. While the closeup is great in its warm golden glow, intimating the approach of sunset, the wider view lets you see the sun dog.

Sure, we were just at Port Orford yesterday, but that was then, and this is now. Something could be different out here today, and sure enough, it is. A couple of fishing boats entered the bay/port area to be removed from the sea, and for maybe the first time, we’d be on hand to see with our own eyes a fishing boat being pulled from the water as there are no berths here.

The dozen or so fishing boats that dry dock here have been seen by us for years, and each time we’ve been here, it seems we learn something new. In addition to seeing the crane at work, we now know that Griffs at the Dock restaurant is no more, likely another victim of the COVID-19 plague.

If we are quick, we might be able to make Bandon for this evening’s final remnants of sunset, so off we go.

No disappointment here as the glow of our nearby star wouldn’t disappear so fast that we’d not be able to offer some oohs and ahhs in appreciation of the spectacular sights that were still on offer.

Light often reacts differently depending on how you choose to perceive it. One minute, it’s warm, but from a second away, it turns cool; light moves as we move and is seen through the filter of our perception and maybe of our expectations to some small degree.

Obviously, or possibly not so obviously, we made it to Bandon and the famous Face Rock and did so just as the sun was about to slip below the horizon.

We’ve been places today, so many that we skipped lunch and only got to dinner after reluctantly leaving this beach. As I write this at the restaurant we are eating at, it’s fully dark out, meaning we used every moment of daylight that was available to us today. While a shared appetizer of clams and a salad started to revive me, I have a lot of nothing to write about at this time. Maybe after we check in to our yurt, I’ll find some inspiration between the countless impressions taken in today.

Bullards Beach State Park is home for the night. Specifically, we are set up in yurt C-39. The heater is on and I’m looking for the switch to turn something on inside of me so the words become as abundant as the skies were blue today. The only thing here in my head with any heft is the weight on my eyes that suggests sleep would be more easily found than inspiration.

With nearly 700 photos shot in the past two days now on the computer, I could review the images of today and write to those, but I nearly resent that the computer is on. It’s only on because I try to make daily backups of the photos I’m taking. As for what’s being written, I’m on page 11 of my Moleskine and have a second pen with me should I put down so much ink, but right now, I feel as though the ink is being wasted.

At 9.5 miles walked today over our 11 hours of exploration, it’s no wonder I just want to do nothing. But who simply stops and ceases to go about not reading, not watching TV, not wanting to go on a starlit walk on the shoreline? There’s no way to bargain with ourselves to call it quits and fall asleep, as remaining in bed for the next 10 hours is a non-starter. In any case, getting up at 5:00 on the coast in November means we’d have to wander around in the dark while the temperature is still in the 30s; there’s no appeal in that idea.

I attribute this apathy to our recent bout of COVID. Nothing like this has ever happened in the past, so I’m in unfamiliar territory. Or am I confusing an insistence to write when at other times I’m content to prep photos and leave the writing to a different day? I find a prolific right hand working my mind’s bidding, typically on lengthy days when the sun shines bright for 15 hours or more. Today, with little more than 10 hours of direct sunlight that facilitates outdoor exploration, I must keep moving during those hours and leave the writing as an evening activity. This has been exacerbated on this trip as there’s an imperative to use our blue skies wisely as the weather forecast gave us two days of clear skies and warned that the following eight would offer rain and cloud cover.

No matter the desire to write, I must concede defeat as all I have in me at this time would read something like this: walked, drove, walked, snuggled, walked, held hands, drove, parked, walked, peed off the trail, walked, said I love you, walked, drove, and in between we kept repeating wow until we ran out of oxygen, finally had dinner. End of day.