We were surprised to awaken this morning to only partly cloudy skies and some sunshine. Our previous 10 days have been filled with funky weather and we were delighted not to hear the little drops drumming on our slide-outs today.

We took advantage of the nice weather by driving a few miles south to Ecola State Park in Cannon Beach. The road going into the park is sort of hidden in a residential neighborhood but we persevered and found our way onto the serpentine, single-lane access road. The road has no guardrails or striping and once over the edge, life would be short and bleak as your vehicle tumbles down the steep canyons alongside the access. The road also passes through an outstanding primordial forest with massive trees, scant sunlight and lots of moss.

Soon we came to an iron ranger that took $5 for us to enter. We coughed up the electronic money and continued on to what is described as the “viewpoint.” The viewpoint is actually a large grass expanse with a few nice benches for sitting while awestruck at the stunning views of the Pacific, waves and the Oregon coastline. The big grass area is where they filmed the scenes involving a restaurant occupied by the evil Fratelli clan in the Spielberg movie The Goonies. The view from here to the south is a spectacular scene of massive offshore rocks called haystacks (as a matter of fact, the biggest one is unsurprisingly called Haystack Rock) and the view to the north is of the Tillamook Point lighthouse which is built atop an offshore haystack rock with a large, turbulent section of ocean keeping tourists at bay. It looked like the only safe access is by helicopter or parachute. Boating looked right out.

The $5 we spent to get in soon seemed like an excellent deal. This park is breathtakingly gorgeous and gets 5 stars on our unofficial guide to nifty places.

For Ecola pix, click the link. https://photos.app.goo.gl/bx2CLBsdc7K8eUH96