Two days of warm sunny weather and I am really loving it down here in southern Oregon. Yesterday I was up and about pretty early, heading first to the beach just outside the campground entrance, and then up the road a couple of miles to a view point where you can see the Cape Arago Lighthouse from. I took lots of pictures of it and the bay out in front of it and even got the telephoto lens out to get a few shots of it closer up. Unfortunately that lighthouse actually sits off the coast a few hundred yards on a small island in the ocean. It also sits on land owned by one of the local Indian tribes in the area so it wouldn't be open to the public even if it was on the main land. I wish I had a longer telephoto lens, about 300 mm would do, but you can only do the best you can with what you have. So those photo's will be up in a day or two.
    From there I drove north out of town towards Reedsport. There is another lighthouse up there, the Umpqua Lighthouse, and it was in my mind to go and see that one also while the sun was out. Found that one with no problem and pretty much drove right up to it. It stands on a point of land above the entrance channel and bar for the Umpqua River. A very pretty little lighthouse, it is still owned and operated by the U.S. Coast Guard. In fact it is on their property and is surrounded by base housing for the people who are stationed there in Reedsport. I took lots of pictures of course and they will also be posted in a day or two.
    From there I was going to head on over to Eugene for a contra dance that night. I had thought that one of my favorite bands and callers was going to be in the area and holding a special dance for the local dance community. It turns out that Wild Asparagus with George Marshall were in the area, but it had been Thursday night, the night before, and not Friday night, that they were playing. So I am very glad to have stopped there in town to grab a quick bite to eat and to get directions to the dance hall before actually driving all the way over there. Instead I came back into the town of North Bend and tried to go to the local historical/maritime museum here. The only problem was that it was closed while they are moving everything into a new building somewhere else in the area.
   At that point I just gave up on doing anything else touristy and just went over to the library for a couple of hours. It was time to catch up on the news as well as deal with a bit of the paperwork stuff that has to get done every month. I'm pleased to note that I'm still solvent enough to keep doing this for a little while longer, even though I'm certainly never going to get rich from it.
   Today was another beautiful day here on the coast. You sometimes need a warm and sunny day to appreciate all those weeks of rain, as it is all that water that makes it so beautiful here when the sun does finally come out again. I went south this morning, going first to the Coquille Lighthouse down near the town of Bandon. A very nice little lighthouse that you can walk right up to. It is no longer owned by the CG and no longer functions as an actual aid to navigation. It still looks okay for the moment, but it will be needing some routine maintenance at some point if it is going to keep looking okay.
    From there I drove on down to the last official lighthouse on the Oregon coast, the one out on Cape Blanco. This one still works as a lighthouse and it is just a delightful small tower with attached oil room that stands on top of a point several hundred feet above the ocean. During the summer months you can drive right out to it, but after October they close off the last half mile or so of road and you have to hoof it out to the top of the point. The view out there is spectacular with lots of rocky 'sea stacks' and off shore shoals where waves are constantly breaking. I had a great time wandering around taking pictures as I seemed to be the only one who wanted to hike out that far today.
    I'm just hanging out at the moment, back here in North Bend at the local Library. Will try to get a few photo's loaded up so that I can post them over the next couple of days. There is suppose to be a local contra dance in Coos Bay this evening so I am going to go and give that a try. It probably won't be quite as good as one with Wild Asparagus playing, but live music is still a whole lot of fun to dance to.

Misc Photo's from around Newport Oregon - Nov 2014.

I love this house. It sits on the banks of the Siletz River just out side the town of Lincoln City Oregon and I drive by and take a picture of it nearly every time I'm in the area. It seems to be in good condition at the moment. A few years back it didn't look like it would make it for very much longer. You might recognize it from the movie 'Never Give an Inch' starring Paul Newman. The movie was based on a Ken Kesey novel called 'Sometimes a Great Notion'.

A foggy day on the Siletz River.

The city of Newport hosts hundreds of California Sea Lions during the winter these days. The are almost all bachelor males who come north to feed in the cold waters off the Oregon coast. In the spring they make the 1,000 mile trip back south to meet up and mate with the females. Or so the sign says.

They are a rather loud and raucous  crowd with their constant barking. Oh.... they also stink. Wet dogs have nothing on these guys.

They like to sleep on some of the docks and can be quite serene until one of them wants to turn over or move, then they all wake up and start barking at each other.

They can be rather cute though.

Look close and you will notice that about half of those lumps out there on the breakwater are actually sea lions.

Looking outbound at Newport's bridge over the Yaquina River. That is the Coast Guard station on the right hand side. 

A walk along the dockside street just at dusk. Had a cup of clam chowder just down the street and I thought this little bar look nice in the dim light and the fog that was starting to roll in.

brk*