The beautiful Pacific Coast highway

     We were up and off by 8:30am, and headed north along the spectacular coast.  Before our planned first stop at Lady Bird Johnson Grove, we saw an RV park (Stone Lagoon RV Park) with about 200 elk roaming free!  We pulled in and drove through the herd, and Dudley went bananas wanting to get out and visit!

       Continuing on to the Redwood Grove, we met a Ranger and asked about walking the dogs.  Couldn't do it there, but he suggested we drive up to the Newton Drury scenic road, which featured about a 15 mile drive through a redwood forrest and places where we could walk the dogs.  We walked a little in this grove first, and it was terrific seeing the beautiful, unspoiled forrest.  Katahdin enjoyed it, too!
     As we drove along the forrest road, Becky spotted a guy on a bicycle with a trailer broken down, and he was waving for help.  Kind of a sad down and out guy, his tire had gone completely flat and wouldn't hold air, and he had his very large cat in the trailer which he held up for us to see!  There was no way we could transport him and we had no cell phone reception, so we gave him some refreshments and called the Rangers for help when we got out of the forrest.

          It's hard to describe how gorgeous it is riding along the coast on US 101--like driving through one postcard scene after another, all the way up through northern California and into Oregon.  The dogs loved getting out in sea air, too!
       When we arrived into Oregon, we stopped at their beautiful Welcome Center right on the beach.  Though it was well supplied with brochures and information, we were disappointed in the seeming disinterest and unknowledgable person who we talked to.  It was a good place for our in-RV lunch, and the dogs loved going out into the dunes--Dudley really wanted to go on the beach, but it was not to be!

      We made the decision to push through to Waldport for the night, as it was still early in the day.  We made a quick stop at Battle Rock State Park and observed the place where the first settlers in 1850 held out on this small piece of land for two weeks besieged by the local natives until they successfully escaped (and returned permanently several months later).

     We finally made it across the spectacular Alsea Bridge over Alsea Bay to a beautiful KOA campground overlooking both it and the ocean.  Jim had a great time going up to the vantage points to take sunset photos, and two of them are posted here.