07/26/10 - Sand Reckoning

03/27/10 - Long Beach, Astoria and Environs

• The Long Beach - Yes, there really is a long beach there, quite long.
• The Columbia River Maritime Museum - gave us a feel for the river, the sea, and those who work at their meeting place.
• Astoria, Oregon - we had lunch at Gunderson's in Astoria
• River View Dining - the best barbequed oysters ever, in South Bend
• Lewis and Clark Interpetive Center - the story of the expedition
• Fort Clatsop - The Lewis and Clark expedition spent its first winter here.
• Leadbetter Point State Park - the park at the northern tip of the Long Beach peninsula
• Miscellaneous - a few pictures from the road

11/13/09 - Second Beach and Winter

We arrived to mixed cloudy skies and a falling tide, but to the west we could see the clouds and pillars of rain closing. We sat on a log and ate our tuna salad sandwiches from Good To Go. A fellow visitor warned us the weather was changing. Then we headed south along the beach. The sky grew grayer and darker. The water was a bit high to make it to the sea cave and the wind was rising from the south. We turned about and headed back. The drizzle started, then turned to rain. At least we didn't have a monkey playground of wet logs to clamber over. We dodged to the muddy safety of the woods and made our way home.

09/16/09 - Ruby Beach

Ruby Beach isn't the longest beach in the area. We spent about half an hour exploring. Still, it is one of the gems of Olympic National Park.

07/31/09 - Rialto Beach

This time the beach was shrouded with Pacific fog, as it often is in the summer. The seastacks were invisible until we were nearly upon them. There was a lot of driftwood, but it was generally piled up high on the beach, even with a high low tide. In another sign of summer, the little river about a mile from the parking lot ran under the sand to the sea. Most of the year we have to ford the stream, but this time we walked right over it without even noticing.

We made it as far as the first headland climb, up into the rain forest. It was almost like climbing a ladder made of tree roots. At the top, we could look through the foliage and see the rocky outcrop that jutted out to the sea like a lost Mayan temple in some adventure romance. We turned around there. We like our adventures, but we like them bite sized.

07/09/08 - Second Beach: To The Seastack

This July 9th was different. This time no confounding body of water appeared as we approached the seastack. Yes, the sand was wet, but we were able to approach the base of the seastack dryshod. The low tide was 0.8 feet, but we had been to Second Beach with lower tides. It took a combination of low tide and sand flow to create the miraculous sandbar we traversed.

The base of the seastack was a jewel box of mussles and barnicles and lesser shells, here and there decorated with dazzling star fish. There were little caves, some worn into the stone and plain, others decorated like the seastack base. We made our way around the seastack, away from the beach. By carefully timing the waves we made it to the small beach between the large landward seastack and the smaller seastack behind it. We explored a bit, admiring our own adventurousness, our good fortune, and the wonderful scenery.

Not ones to press our luck, we made our way back after a brief sojourn, and explored the beachward face of the seastack. We have seen people climbing seastacks, and we considered climbing this one, but we Kalebergs have more the grace of gazebos than gazelles, so we settled for a sea level tour.

Our return to the beach along the sandbar was straightforward. This is just as well. We always like to be able to retrace our steps. We then explored Second Beach to the south, wandering about the Pirate Cave and gawking at anemones in the various tidepools. When we returned to the sandbar that led to the seastack the tide had risen. A fair bit of the sandbar was already submerged. We had seized our opportunity. Time and tide, we knew, wait for no man.

01/08/08 - New Software - Sunrise, Sunset and iCal

Apparently, a number of people like using iCal, the Macintosh calendar program, but it is sometimes hard to find the calendar you want. TideCal will make a hiker's tidal calendar, while other sites provide calendars with holidays, sporting events, historical birthdays and other such wonders. Now there is an iCal calendar generator for people who just want to know when the sun will rise and set. We call it Sunrise Sunset.

In the traditional of fine Kaleberg Kludges, it requires that you know your latitude and longitude (try getting a map bookmark from Google Maps), your time zone offset, and if you aren't in the US, when daylight saving time starts and ends. We make no warrantees or representations, just software.

09/03/07 - The Eagle and the Shark

On our way south to the sea cave we noticed a small shark stranded on a sand bar. We considered helping, but were separated by a rather deep bit of water. It wasn't clear we could get to the shark without getting soaked. Besides, there had just been an article in the New York Times about a shark saved at Rockaway Beach. The shark had been "saved", but a day later it was found washed ashore, dead. Healthy sharks stay in the water.

As we returned from the cave and watched the rising tide, we saw an eagle swoop in the distance. We knew its target, the shark. The shark was still alive when we passed, but the eagle was guarding it. We kept our distance. There is no point in having a dust up with one's national emblem. While we like shark, we were willing to give him or her dibs on this one.

This sort of scene is part of nature's way. We know that, but it usually is done off camera.

04/26/07 - Second Beach Report

In honor of Second Beach being reopened, we've updated our Kaleberg report, and we've added lots of new pictures in hopes of luring more people to this often overlooked gem on the Pacific.

04/12/07 - Rialto Beach

We were able to get past the one mile crossing on our latest visit. There is much less water flowing in the stream there, so the water is only a few inches deep down by the ocean. Watch for the tumbling rocks, and don't stop for long. The water will undercut you.

We sighted several eagles, some starfish, and the crew, with tents, carts and cameras, out on a Tommy Hilfiger fashion shoot. It was quite a production.

03/26/07 - Wild Water at Rialto Beach

One of the problems with visiting Rialto Beach when one is very clumsy is that about a mile north of the parking lot there is a river to cross. Most of the time this river is rather shallow, so we wade across. One time, the tide was so low that we could cross near the ocean where the river ran under the sand. On our last visit, we could not cross at all. As you can see in the picture to the left, or more graphically in our video, the spring rains have filled the river nicely. The water was deep and the current strong.

Even if we had not been so clumsy, our crossing was unlikely. Most of the crossing logs have been washed away. A few intrepid sorts had managed to cross on some logs a bit upriver, but this was beyond us. We'll be back at Rialto Beach again soon, and we'll hope the high waters have subsided.

06/13/06 - Return to Rialto Beach

We have been missing Second Beach, which is still closed due to a failure of our government to complete a sensible land swap with the Quillayute tribe. So, we decided to go back to Rialto Beach, and it turns out that we have forgotten just how beautiful it is there. We explored up past the first headland and had a little jungle journey, and we took lots of pictures. While we still miss Second Beach, Rialto Beach has a lot to offer, even to us Kalebergs.

UPDATE 06/21 - We've added a panorama of the beach for those who have wondered what the seastacks must look like from a helicopter.

08/05/05 - TideCal - Tides for iCal

07/01/05 - Solstice Tides

06/01/05 - Tide Finder for Finding Good Tides

01/05/05 - Sunset at Second Beach

07/20/04 - Rialto Beach and Second Beach

06/24/04 - The Fawns of Cape Alava