Friday June 16, 21.9mi/35.2km

Above Short Sand Beach (45.1/120ft) to Barview Jetty County Campground (66.4/15ft) (OR) + 0.6mi Manzanita lunch stop

I packed up and left my improvised camp spot, which was surprisingly comfortable. In a few minutes I was at Short Sand beach.

It was only 7:30 and already there were a bunch of surfers out enjoying the waves. I sat at one of the many picnic tables and enjoyed my breakfast. Afterwards, I hiked out of the picnic area only to find that the bridge had been destroyed by a fallen tree.

The stream was almost dry, so it was simple to rock hop across and continue on. I began the long slow climb up to the top of Neahkahnie Mountain. The trail switchbacked up the hillside and went right underneath this big tree!

After a little ways I entered a meadow with great views back towards the ocean.

After crossing highway 101 there was a small trailhead.

The trail climbed over 1,000 feet/300m up through a mature forest to the top of a ridge.

At one of the many switchbacks there was this confusing sign. It didn’t say what the danger was, so I was rather curious.

An hour later I was at the top of the mountain with a great view down to the town of Manzanita and the beach.

I had a snack break up top but it was a little chilly so I didn’t stay long. As soon as I crossed over this ridge it was a little windy too.

The downhill went quickly and pretty soon I was back down in greener terrain.

These vertical purple flowers were surprisingly abundant.

There were even a few of these thin little snakes! They were pretty short, only 12 inches/30cm.

After an hour of descending, I crossed back over Highway 101 and headed to the coast.

I walked through a neighborhood to get to the beach, and they had this funny sign.

The beach walk was windy, so thankfully I was only on it for a mile before I turned off into the town of Manzanita.

Time to grab some lunch! There were several burrito places.

Fortunately I chose the burrito place where you could get it smothered with red and green chile sauce.

It’s pretty rare to see that option outside of the Four corners States, so I was pretty excited. I made a quick stop to the grocery store for some ice cream and snacks.

And then I walked a couple blocks back to the beach. It was still windy and now it was foggy too.

I always walk on the hard packed sand since that is much easier to hike on, and I noticed there were signs that prohibited people from walking on the soft sand where birds were nesting.

An hour later I was at Nehalem Bay, and the only way across was to get a boat ride. I called the marina which was only a few hundred yards away across the channel.

While I was waiting for them to come pick me up I noticed someone had lined up a lot of crabs on the beach.

And these seals were in the water playing!

The guy from the marina came and got me 10 minutes later, and I threw my backpack in the fishing boat.

The marina also had a seafood business, so of course I had to try a Dungeness crab.

I had intended this to be a quick stop, but cracking into a crab is slow work so I was there for almost an hour. I finally left the marina at 5pm and hiked along the jetty back to the beach.

The beach walk was very nice and the wind had finally stopped. I passed by this cool formation called Twin Rocks.

As usual, there were a few people out walking on the beach. Two women were walking in my direction and joined me for 20 minutes of conversation. They were training for the “Hood to Coast” race in 2 months, a popular annual relay race in Portland. They were fun to talk to and the time flew by. Pretty soon I was at the end of the beach.

I exited the beach and walked into Barview Jetty County campground. It was a huge Campground, mostly full of RVs, so it took me awhile to find the hiker/biker site. I had to walk all the way out to the entrance station to get a map and a permit, and then walk a half mile back to the campsite. Clearly this place was designed by somebody with a car! I setup in my nice little camp spot and had dinner at a picnic table, it felt so civilized.

Another day on the Oregon coast!