Lincoln City and Depoe Bay

We didn't sleep in like yesterday morning - this morning was a much earlier one. Not because we planned it that way, we just woke up early. It was 6:30am and we were all ready for the day. So we put our things in the car and went back into the hotel for breakfast. But they don't start serving breakfast until 7:00am. So we decided it would be nice to have a real breakfast so we got in the car and went to find someplace that was open. We ended up at the Pig 'n Pancake and had a good breakfast and lots of coffee. After eating we headed over to D River Beach Wayside to find the two boxes for the We LOVE Lincoln City! series. The clues were easy and finding the boxes was easy - both boxes were hidden within 50 feet of each other. So we got both boxes found a place to sit (that was out of the wind) and stamped in. It was a little cold this morning so I didn't waste time - I got the stamping done and the boxes back into their hiding places within 20 minutes. After that was done we headed down to the water for a little walk. There was a sea lion that was on the beach and someone had put stakes up with 'Caution!' tape around the sea lion and a note that said it might be sick and dangerous so please don't get too close. It was alive and moving but very slow and only a little. It was really cute and we wondered why some 'Save the Animals' organization hadn't come and move it - oh, well. I felt really bad for the little guy.

We got back in the car and headed to Devil's Lake. Our first stop was the boat ramp area. When we pulled in we saw tons of people and a sign that the boat ramp was closed for the boat races. We found a place to park and went in search of the first box there. Unfortunately we didn't find the box - we tried multiple attempts trying to make sense of the clues but we still came up empty handed. Now on to the next box - this was in the same area but on the other side of the parking lot. It was a series of two boxes. We followed the clues for box 1 and didn't find it and we are 95% sure we were in the right place - at least all the clues made sense. We were able to find the second box and get stamped in to it. After replacing it we left that area of the park and headed for another spot. Sand Point Park is closer to the northern end of the lake and is very small but really nice. It has a little boardwalk that leads down to the beach right on the lake. We were able to see some of the boats that were racing today from this spot. We found the box easily enough but I was really disappointed that it was a store bought stamp. I know I have said this before but I would much rather find the ugliest hand carved stamp instead of a store bought one. Anyway, I replaced the box after stamping in and we left that park. We drove around to the western side of the lake to Holmes Road Park and came up empty handed here. Followed the clues to the letter but no box. Next stop was Regatta Park. We had a little trouble finding this box simply because the number of steps were off. When we finally found the box we retraced our steps and counted them and the only thing we can think of is that a child counted them off - none of our steps matched the clues. But I digress - I stamped into the box and got it hidden again and then we were off to one last stop at the lake - the campground. We took an easy little trail across a boardwalk that lead to a boat ramp area (not the one that we were at before - this one was on the opposite side of the lake). We needed to find a "Y" tree and guess what - we found four of them. So we had to check each of them, well actually on our third tree we found the box. It was a nice stamp and there were picnic table where I stamped in. I rehid the box and we were on our way.

During our last letterbox hunt my camera batteries died. I had left the second set at the hotel. So we went back there and I got the charged batteries into the camera and we left again. But not to go letterboxing. We returned to Roads End State Recreation Site. Yesterday we walked to an area of the beach where there are tide pools but the tide was too high to see them. So I checked the tide table this morning and found out that the low tide was a little after noon for today. So we had planned to walk the beach again and check them out. We went prepared today - we had our kayaking shoes and we rolled up our pants so that we could walk along the water without worrying about getting our regular shoes soaked. When we arrived at the area we were thrilled. The tide was quite low and we could see lots of exposed areas that just weren't visible yesterday. We saw red star fish, tan star fish, green anemones, barnacles and clams. It was really cool and we had a great time. Of course we both got pretty wet, mostly the lower part of our pants but with the waves splashing the top part of our pants and parts of our shirts were wet by the time we were done. I got some good pictures and we really had a good time. We needed to go back to the hotel and change - it was just too cold to stay in wet jeans for the rest of the day.

After changing into dry clothes we gathered all our dirty clothes from the trip so far and loaded them into the car - at the end of the day we were going to look for a laundromat - we need a few things cleaned to last through the rest of the trip. We also wanted to grab a quick lunch before doing anything else. We left the hotel and stopped a little restaurant for salads and then we headed to Depoe Bay. We wanted to see Devil's Punch Bowl and look for some letterboxes in that area. We stopped at the Cape Foulweather Lookout first and found two boxes - one of which I think is an incredible stamp but we really enjoyed both boxes. Once they were back in place we continued on Otter Crest Loop to Devil's Punch Bowl. We only got a look from above and it was a little hard to see, but you could get the idea. If it had been low tide we could have gone down on the beach for a better look. Just down the road from here we took a trail and found one box - there were some great views from this box and I enjoyed sitting there taking it all in. After finishing box one we headed to the next street over and walked a second trail to find two more boxes. When those were in place we noticed the time and decided to drive back to Lincoln City and get the clothes done. Now that all is clean and we are packed we can head out tomorrow to continue our journey south - tomorrow night we stay in Florence.