Oregon Dunes

Except for one day of rain, the weather had been perfectly sunny ever since I left Chicago. And so it was amusing that the EXACT instant I crossed over the Oregon border, the skies darkened and a slight drizzle began to fall. It was as if Mother Nature said, “Hello son, welcome back to the Pacific Northwest.”

Drizzle turned into torrential downpour by the time I reached the John Dellenback/Umpqua Dunes trailhead. This was definitely the hiking highlight of the trip. It starts off paved and boring but the trail quickly opens up to an ocean of sand with giant dunes and little tree islands here and there. There’s not much of a trail here, just some wooden markers scattered about that indicate the path you are supposed to follow. After clambering up the first dune, it’s a bit of a struggle to see the markers because I am being absolutely blasted by the roaring wind, rain, and sand. I nearly crush several tiny green frogs hopping around as I stumble through the dunes.

Eventually, the trail enters a dense wooded area and its like an entirely different world. Eerily quiet and dark. Finally, the trail leads out to the ocean. I’ve never actually seen the NW coast during good weather. In Hawaii, the ocean always has a graceful, peaceful quality to it even when the waves are ridiculously huge and powerful. Here though, the ocean has a pissed off look to it with the frothing whitecaps and the grayish, sickly looking sand. It’s different but still nice in an Oh-God-I-Want-To-Kill-Myself kind of way.