This example of a still-mobile older woman walking down the beach proves that human fossils still have a life after 50 years of age. Not only is she capable of getting outside of her routine, here at the cusp of summer on the Oregon coast where it was a brisk 48 degrees (9 Celsius) (though with the wind chill factored in, it felt like 40 degrees (4.5 Celsius)), this fine example of womanhood girded her loins and showed the male of the species how being tough is done. What she forgets is that her mate is at an advanced age of 61 and that has likely mastered the art of the whine, not so much for effect but for the sake of annoying the female, who has shown the kind of thin skin that lets her cringe every time he opens his mouth.

Oops, I wasn’t supposed to start this post speaking of our own fossilized natures and humor. I was supposed to save that for describing the awesome seashells encased in rock here on Wade Creek Beach.

In a flash, a bald eagle soared overhead, marking the first time Caroline and I had ever seen one of these majestic birds in Oregon.

Initially, my own half-fossilized brain had more questions than answers when looking at these ancient artifacts from distant times, such as: will I see fish or marine mammal skeletal remains, or why have all of those fossil remnants fallen out of the cliffside that’s overhead? Excitement clouds the brain, or in keeping with the getting old jokes, the elderly mind is clouded by its aged state. Anyway, there are simple, easy answers.

And part of that answer starts right here with the fossilized dinosaur skin. Just kidding, this is what’s known as columnar jointing and can occur from cooling andesite magma. Sorry but I’m not going into a full science lesson to describe it all.

In a nutshell, as lava was flowing to the sea, there were times when ash, mud, or lava was reaching the shore and, at times, further into the ocean. While I’m no expert on such matters, these jointed columns likely used to lie under the sea or being eroded by waves due to their smooth surfaces.

The reason we’re only seeing shellfish would be that as the ash and mud were flowing into the nearby waters, they were rolling over the clams, scallops, snails, mussels, and barnacles that couldn’t move out of the way. As for the plant life that would have been covered in such a grave, I do not know why there is no visual record of their previous existence. Maybe if I looked closer and took a moment from being so enchanted by the largest, most obvious finds, I’d start to see the plant fossils.

And then there’s the matter of plate tectonics and continental drift, which shoves massive parts of the earth around, such as uplifting the Pacific Coast where the obvious recipient of these herculean efforts of nature are witnessed as mountains, but even at the seashore, there’s no reason to doubt that at times, these lands are uplifted as well. So, this explains why all this stuff is now overhead instead of deep below our feet. About this blue rock, it’s actually clay that was once volcanic ash that might be deficient in iron and aluminum. (I wrote about that during a visit to Moolack Beach six years ago.) As for the separating bands of different materials responsible for the strange patterns, I’m going to guess that those were sediments that had the chance to accumulate between ash flows.

And this concludes our exciting morning walk at Wade Creek Beach. My next check-in will be after 5:00, when Caroline and I take off for another grand coastal adventure here in Oregon.

This just in: family circumstances, being the fluid things they are, have created a situation where our hosts, June and Marvin, have had to cancel their trip to France. Obviously, the right thing to do was for me to offer them their home back, as they are now down in the super-hot Valley of the Sun baking themselves instead of enjoying the smell of freshly baked croissants on the streets of France. While we’ve been reassured that we do not have to bail out on our work/vacation stay here in Oregon, it was a quick lesson in how attached we’d already become to this luxury at the seashore. It’s also a great reminder not to get too attached to things, as nothing is permanent. Be grateful for every moment and celebrate those times because you never know what tomorrow brings.

The workday finally came to an end, and a quick dinner was shared before our five-minute drive north to Fogarty Creek Beach. With only minutes past high tide, we were limited on how far we could walk here, so we aimed for a turnoff a minute north across the street from the Chester Market to see if there was beach access over there.

Lincoln Beach, still in Depoe Bay, is a nice sandy affair, but maybe it’s too clean, according to Caroline. There will be no beachcombing at a place without rocks, shells, trash, or cliffside fossils. Nothing left to do but bring out Happy McKiteface.

We were surprised at how easily the kite went aloft even though the wind was a light affair. Maybe it was just a breeze, but up the kite went, as did the smile on my wife’s face.

There’s a serious joy had by Caroline when she’s flying a kite. I asked her about it, and she equates it to taking a dog for a walk where it tugs and pulls at its lead, which, in a way, animates both the kite and the sky above us. I probably took close to 40 photos of us trying to get one that worked. In portrait mode, I kept slicing off half of my head, and in landscape mode, the Caroline’s kite was out of the frame, or we were too dark, cut off, only heads without shoulders and a ton of sky above us, or some other mishap of lacking photographic skills that denied us a selfie with our pet kite. Remember, we are using a DSLR instead of a phone, so I cannot see the screen. However, while the camera has a screen, I find it too distracting, and end up looking at it instead of the center of the lens.

While there were not as many photos to share today as other days, don’t think for an instant that it was any less spectacular. Not only did we spend every minute near each other, but after we returned to the house, we finally took advantage of the hot tub bubbling away at a toasty 105 degrees (44.5 Celsius). Next time, we’ll plug in the spotlight that points at a disco ball that we only saw after we took our seats in the tub. Seriously perfect.