Pacific Northwest 2021: Cannon Beach, Tillamook, Cape Meares, Newport

 We headed to Cannon Beach again the next morning. It was foggy and a bit chilly.

Look at the low tide!

We saw baby sea stars! They are grayish and there are at least three of them in this picture.

Gooseneck barnacles, including one with its neck out.

Sea stars and giant green anemones

Three purple sea stars of differing shades.

So many giant green anemones

Sea stars and kelp

Many western gulls

A few puffins!

Megan, Me and Matthew

It is really pretty.

Sarah hung out in a chair while the rest of us looked at birds and tidepools.  She had a hard time pulling the chair out since it had sunk deeply into the sand.

We packed up and headed south. We had some really nice views as we headed down the coast. Here is the view from Neahkahnie Mountain.

We stopped at the Tillamook Factory.

U and Sarah on a road trip.

Megan and Matthew on a road trip.

We went on the self-guided factory tour of the cheese factory. Here they are vacuum sealing 40 blocks of cheese.

See the boxed cheese come up the conveyor belt? It reminds me of the conveyor belt for gifts in the Polar Express. The boxed cheese is on its way to be aged.

Here the cheese is getting cut and weighed.

We had ice cream for lunch. Matthew, U, Sarah and Megan

Replica of the boat they used to bring their goods to Portland.

Sarah, Megan and U in front of the sign.

We stopped at Cape Meares and did a few short hikes. The rocks to the right in the photo are part of Three Arches National Wildlife Refuge. It's where the largest colony of tufted puffins is in the US outside of Alaska. And 100,000 common murres nest there!

Monkey Matthew

And Megan

U and Sarah with the Octopus Tree. It is a Sitka spruce with 8 arms.

Sarah and Me with the Cape Meares lighthouse. It is the shortest lighthouse on the Oregon coast.

U with the lighthouse.

Me being silly.

Our hotel room in Newport. The kids liked that we could check out DVDs and that they could get saltwater taffy from the front desk.

Matthew with the sofa sleeper, table and chairs.

The view from our balcony. It was very windy. We saw lots of sand blowing along the beach.

Yaquina Head Lighthouse