05/15/24 - Second Beach at Low Tide - Part 1

The beach is always changing. One nice change, at least for us, was that there was no maze of driftwood between the base of the trail and beach proper. Many years, there's an entire jungle gym of great fallen logs and ocean washed branches to clamber over. We're not very good at clambering, but there are probably people for whom this is the best part.

The other great change is that the starfish are back. There was a period not all that many years ago where they had vanished. Some starfish disease had wiped out most of them. Now they were everywhere, clinging to rocks in stark contrast.

05/14/24 - Second Beach at Low Tide - Part 2

As a bonus for visiting Second Beach at low tide, our GPS track was underwater. The edge of land ever changes with the tides, so the cartographers tend to mark the high tide line. That means a low tide walk takes one past the land's end.

07/07/23 - Second Beach, Low Tide, Ocean Mist

We took so many pictures, we had to break this into two posts. This section focuses on the sea, sand, seastacks and spray. The other section focused more on the tide pools and the amazing return of the starfish.

08/01/21 - Second Beach at Extreme Low Tide

We expected big crowds, but the trail and beach were relatively quiet. The Third Beach trailhead parking lot, in contrast, was overflowing. We hiked through the forest and descended to the beach. There is usually a driftwood barrier to clamber over, but the beach was clear this time. The driftwood had drifted elsewhere.

We made our way to the sea stack dry shod. It was great to see so many starfish. With the plague wiping out so many of them some years back and recent stories of sea creatures being cooked in their shells we expected the worst. There were starfish and a good many of them. It was far from the years before the plague, but they were not hard to find.

We explored the sea stack, its caves and its seaward side. Then we headed down the beach into the light mist. With an extreme negative tide like this, there was lots of beach and it was easy going. There were more starfish down near the cave at the end of the beach and anemones galore. We spent some time exploring here and then made our way back to the return forest trail.

07/12/19 - Second Beach - Low Tide

The big news was starfish everywhere, but more on that in another post. For this post, the big news was a journey out to a usually inaccessible sea stack and getting a chance to explore its caves, beaches and tide pools.

07/11/19 - Second Beach - Starfish

06/20/18 - Second Beach - Starfish

06/19/18 - Second Beach - To The Seastack

We were in time for the really low tide. We made our way south along the beach and were soon on a spit of beach heading towards the seastack. Sometimes it is possible to get to the seastack dry shod, but we had to wade for a bit, but we did it. We made it out to the seastack, and we had a pleasant surprise. There were starfish there, waiting out the low tide.

10/12/16 - Second Beach

06/26/16 - Second Beach at Low Tide

We made our way along the beach and started our approach. There was a spit of sand jutting out towards the sea stack, but it ended a bit short. There was still a channel to cross, so we took off our shoes and laid them on what passed for high ground. Then we waded out. The water came over our knees, but only for a few steps. Then we were approaching the caves at the base of the sea stack.

We made our way around to the tide pools, and there we saw them - starfish. There was a starfish plague a year or two ago, and it wiped out just about every starfish in the Pacific northwest, even the ones in aquariums. But, here in the tide pools at the base of this inaccessible sea stack, there were starfish, dozens of them. They were clutching the rocks by the pools full of anemones. It was really good to see them.

We only spent so long at the sea stack. The tide was already rising, and our shoes were in imminent danger. We reclaimed them and walked south along beach revealed only when the tide was this low. We made our way to the little sea cave at the southern end of the beach, braving the clouds of sea mist that swirled along the beach. Out at sea we could see the Pacific mist condensing into purplish clouds out past the line of sea stacks.

All told it was an amazing visit. Even when the tide is negative, the isolated sea stack is often still unreachable. We had only made our way out there once before, so getting back out there again was a real treat.

08/25/14 - Second Beach - Surf's Up

There were a lot of folks camping, including a den of pirates, possibly hiding out from the minions of the RIAA. We also saw a few surfers, black forms in their wet suits. They splashed their way out from shore, then rode the waves gracefully back to the shallows. Second Beach is not a tropical paradise like Waikiki. It's a more mysterious place with fog, cold water and an essential wildness, and all the more attractive for it.

We made our way to the sea cave and tide pools at the south end of the beach and are sad to report that there were no star fish there. They've been dying from some mysterious disease, but we had hopes.

10/18/13 - Second Beach

The beach itself was easy to reach. First there is a little climb, then the forest walk, and then the twisting descent through the forest to the beach. There are glimpses of the ocean as the trail descends. Then, trail breaks out to the beach, wide, bright and open. It almost feels like going outside, but first there is the driftwood. Some years there is quite a substantial barrier. Some years it is a simple step onto the sand. Right now, most of the driftwood is gone. There is some, but it's more of a simple maze than a challenge course.

We were two hours before low tide, but it was a very low tide, so there was a lot of wet beach, gray and sparkling. The seastacks were as magical as ever. They almost seem impossible, or at least improbable, but there they are, remnants of an eroding shoreline, each with its own watershed and forested topping, an ecological island of fresh water surrounded by salt.

We made our way south, stopping to explore a few tidal pools and checking out the star fish and anemomes. The tide was far out and there was a lot of sand. We walked the still wet sand to the little sea cave and then made our way out towards the headland. In winter, this area is often rocky, but it was still summer here. We explored the coves and the rocks at the base of the far seastacks, then, well before low tide we started home.

07/12/12 - Second Beach

The beach was easy walking, just a broad sand plain. There seemed to be more sand than usual, and some of the rocks we'd see along the shore appeared to be more deeply buried than we remembered. This was particularly noticeable on narrow section of beach towards the sea cave with many familiar rocks less visible and a deeply cut stream channel running through the sand.

In contrast, the entrance to the sea cave was rocky. All of the sand there had washed out. The tide was low, but not a real low low tide, so we didn't visit the hidden beaches past the cave, though we could see a lot more rocks and a lot less sand.

We had a nice picnic lunch on the beach, and made our way home through the forest, pausing to admire the Treasure Tree which was sporting a variety of pretty stones, bright red berries and feathers. We're not sure who contributes, but they've done a great job. Unlike Rialto Beach nearby, Second Beach is a hidden beach, not visible from the road and a special treasure because of this.

06/14/11 - Second Beach Driftwood Report

The payoff was as wonderful as ever. The beach was broad, flat and firm. There was a bit of mist in the distance, but otherwise we had good clear views. We made our way south, avoiding the puddles of left over ocean and admiring the huddled star fish and anemones as we explored. It was pretty easy going. The beach had lots of sand, so it was easy getting to the little cave. We lacked the energy to go much farther, not really wanting to deal with the barnicle and seaweed encrusted rocks.

We saved our strength for the climb out, a clamber back over the driftwood and then a brutal 200 foot or so climb out. If we're sounding pathetic here, we apologize. We often go to Second Beach when we are tired. It's a great place to recover with some sea air and spectacular scenery. This was no exception. We came back much invigorated by the sea.

09/05/10 - Second Beach Report

05/04/10 - Second Beach

On the plus side, the big pile of driftwood seems to be shrinking. The clamber out to the beach was much easier than we had expected, and several of the really big logs seemed to have drifted back out to sea.

02/22/10 - Second Beach

01/25/10 - Second Beach

01/08/10 - The Driftwood Is Coming Back To Second Beach