The Beachcombers

Mar 8 & 9, 2006.
We have a favourite place – one that we return to and will continue to as long as we can. It’s Sea Perch RV Park south of Yachats (pronounced Ya-hats) and north of Florence, Oregon. This day and the next are to be spent in our favourite place.

It was overcast when we awoke in North Bend but not raining and we had no rain on the 65-mile drive north to ‘our favourite place’. Our last visit was a year and a half ago in midsummer when we had glorious sunshine and blue skies with an occasional bit of wind. We, along with our daughter and her family spent a week flying kites, building sandcastles and beachcombing.

This visit was different. We said back then that we’d love to come to this spot in the winter storm season and a major storm, the worst in three years according to the TV news, hit us shortly after we arrived. We nudged Maggie into her solitary site only about fifty feet from the ocean and were thrilled to discover, when plugging her in, that we had all the comforts - cable TV and free Wifi. We extended the slides, levelled with the push of a button and Voila! Let the storm begin.

Within the hour, the storm attacked the coast violently. We huddled inside glorying in the spectacle of the wild and churning sea. The wind gusts shook the motorhome and blew under the canopy over our long slide – thump, thwack, thwack, THWACK, THUMP – it sounded like we’d be sucked up into the tempest like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. So we retracted the slide and then felt safe.

The ominous dark olive ocean, with tide so high it seemed to be approaching our motorhome, was a boiling cauldron of foam. Gulls flying into the wind made no headway and stood still in the sky – then suddenly, the wind would catch under their wings and they were swooped away on a wild ride. They’d do it over and over again. The crows weren’t as happy with the blustery weather. They grouped on the grass, necks hunched low so their heads were scrunched tight into their bodies. It was a thrilling afternoon, watching raw nature from the warm comfort of Maggie.

About 4:30pm, the horizon started to brighten and the wind abated. The light grew and blue patches appeared in the sky. Here was our opportunity to get out and walk on the beach, but do you think we could budge Caesar? “Not a chance!” he seemed to say as we urged him. So we went without him clad in multi layers of clothes – sweat shirts, rain gear, hoods and our lovely ‘duck shoes’ and we fought the bracing wind, clambering across rocks and driftwood onto the cement-hard sand. The sound of the crashing surf was deafening. A gull had caught a large crab and was pecking at it voraciously. He flew off as we approached but watched so he could return. The poor crab, on its back, was still alive- its legs moving weakly, trying to get up I suppose. So we hastened away so the gull could return and put the crab out of its misery.

As I poured a glass of wine and prepared dinner with the most amazing view in the world right in front of me, I pondered if it could get any better than this.