On Tuesday, we took a much needed down day.  We were staying at a great campground outside of Newport, Oregon, for two nights.  One of the girls had mentioned that we needed to stop at some of these thrift shops that we’ve seen, so Charlie suggested that anyone who wanted to should go thrift store shopping that morning.  He certainly didn’t have to ask me twice! 

Myself and 5 of the 6 kids went to see what deals we could find.  When I searched for thrift shops in the area, my phone seemed to indicate that most of them were closed on Tuesday.  We did find a Goodwill that said it was open, so we drove over there.  Much to our dismay, it was the first Goodwill Boutique store that we had ever encountered.  Everything they carried in there seemed like it was a little too fancy for our tastes.  We didn’t stay very long.  Then I found one more store that looked to be open, but when we drove over there, the store didn’t seem to exist at all.  Oh well…so much for thrifting.

The rest of the day was spent reading books, doing laundry, making dinner, and walking along the beach.  The slow-paced day was just what we needed.

One of our goals on the Oregon coast was to check out tidal pools for cool sea-life.  We missed our low-tide opportunity to do that on Tuesday, so we planned our departure around it on Wednesday.  We left the campground Wednesday morning in coordination with the 25 minute drive to the Yaquina Head Outstanding National Area and the tide schedule. 

When we got there, we jumped around a bunch of rocks looking to see what we could find.  We saw several sea anemones and just a couple sea stars. 

Then we went to the Interpretive Center and learned about the wildlife of the area as well as the local lighthouse. 

Before leaving, we decided to drive down to the lighthouse.  That’s when we found the much better tidal pools for viewing wildlife and were able to see sea urchins in addition to what we had already seen. 

We were even able to see Harbor Seals swimming around and sunbathing on the nearby rocks.  I was only disappointed that I had left my binoculars in the car again.

By the end of the day, we had driven the entire way up the Oregon coast on Hwy 101. It was a beautiful drive and highly recommended. Washington, here we come!

Rebecca