Then & Now – Cape Lookout, 11 Mos. Later

One of the cool things about travelling w/ a laptop is that you’ve got a bit of your personal history w/ you. Last August, Rich & I spent a wonderful week travelling down the Oregon Coast, en route to Medford. We planned our hotels around hikes we wanted to do (not the other way around, as in most cases, I suppose). We weren’t able to book the Ecola Creek Lodge last year, as it is owned by Cannon Beach Conference Centre & Luis Palau just happened to be in town when we wanted to be, too. I guess Luis is a bigger draw than we are, LOL. So I think it was when we were staying in Cape Kiwanda that we went on our Cape Lookout hike.

Enough of the unimportant details. We had a wonderful week hiking up & down the Coast last year, but Cape Lookout was a bit of a disappointment, only b/c it was so foggy. We’ve heard it was a great hike, & from a trail perspective, it was. From a scenery perspective, it was a wash-out, or rather, a white-out.

It was on this hike, the Cape Lookout hike, that we heard one of our favourite hiking quotes last year. The trail was quite muddy last year, & after we traversed one particularly gooey section, a hiker coming the other way gave us this gem:

“If your boots are clean, you’re standing ste-ill” (southern accent). That’s kinda been our mud motto since! This year, the trail was dry – just one little muddy section, making the boardwalks seem silly (they seemed silly in some places last year, too, but b/c the trail was so muddy that even the boardwalks didn’t help much).

Here, I’ll show you what I am talking about. Pictures from last year, side-by-side w/ pictures from this year:

August 5, 2008 – Pretty foggy (& muddy)…

July 2, 2009 – Beautiful!!


At the trailhead - (L) Aug. 5, 2008; (R) July 2, 2009 (the sun is even casting shadow on my face from my silly hat!)

One of the clearer points on the trail last year. Interesting taht we took almost the same picture!

Top – Last year; bottom – this year. Much clearer! Look at the colour of the water!


The brave little tree that grows on the side of a windy, rocky cliff. Last yr & this yr


We almost stood on the same spot… Funny – I had that red shirt in my pack yesterday. I could have been wearing the same thing, too! Hahaha (Looks like I’m wearing the same socks… but I only have so many pairs of hiking socks…)

For some reason, the author of the trail book we used called this hike “Moderate.” I guess b/c of elevation gain? After seeing what was in the “Easy” day hikes book at Tahoe, this hike would easily fall into that author’s “easy” category. I didn’t show you the picture of the crowd at the terminus of the trail (the point above), but there were lots of people on this trail, including little kids. One lady even hiked in holding her sleeping 2 y/o (?) in her arms. She said she didn’t want to do that again! Pretty easy – some ups, but pretty easy. The “moderate” rating really stumps me.

Today (what is it, the 3rd? Friday??), we leave the Coast & head to Redmond to spend a couple more days w/ MIL. Then it’s home. Wow, this trip is almost over. But we’re having fun looking fwd to our trip to the Rockies in August. If the patchy fogs clears this morning, we’ll head over to Ecola Park (literally, just up the road) for a quick hike from the picnic area to Indian Beach (or vice versa) before we hit the road.

But 1st, here’s my parting shot for the day… We went to Ecola Park for sunset last night. Here’s what we got: