I could have posted a photo of our yurt from the night before, but I’ve probably posted that exact yurt half a dozen other times. Last night, though, we had a new experience here on the coast as we stayed in a cabin, and so here’s a photo of that deluxe cabin complete with shower, toilet, and rudimentary kitchen. Was it worth $100, considering we had to supply bedding and head to the store to buy two towels? Nope. Had we been better prepared with wood for the fire pit, coals for the barbecue, and had a couple of friends with us it would have been a great deal. While I’ve said it before, it bears repeating that coastal Oregon State Parks are amazing for their proximity to the ocean and their fully equipped campgrounds.
You are looking at the mouth of the Columbia River and the endpoint of Lewis & Clark’s journey across the western United States. It’s blustery out here and significantly colder than other places along the coast we’ve been so far, must be cold air blowing in from Washington across the river.
From there, we drove into Warrenton to find some breakfast at Arnie’s Cafe. They do a great job, so great that you have to wait for a table. Breakfast foods don’t often photograph well, so instead; I present you with a small lake we drove by after our morning feast.
We checked in with Fort Clatsop National Historical Park to make sure Caroline wasn’t missing any levels from her Junior Ranger badges, as she thought there was an award she didn’t have. Turns out there was a consolidation of awards so she already had everything she would ever earn here. While in the visitors center, I noticed a road through part of the park we’d not previously traveled and so that’s where this part of the story picks up. We are at Netul Landing, taking a walk over to the South Slough Trail.
The first part of the path is flat and takes us along the Lewis & Clark River. We could stay on this trail, which would bring us back to the visitors center, where we could turn left and hit the “Fort To Sea Trail,” which is a 6.1-mile hike, but we are more interested in the slough today.
At a fork with a sign pointing to “Steep Trail,” we crossed the road and nearly immediately climbed the equivalent of about 15 flights of stairs (not pictured). This was a thigh-burning climb that had us thinking that we wouldn’t want to go down the same path on a wet trail. Fortunately, it’s a loop, so there won’t be any backtracking today.
The area shows heavy evidence of a clear-cut done in the past with large old tree trunks still rotting on the steep hillside. The entire area, including the slough, is going through a restoration in order to restore the habitat that had been left in ruin.
How long has this tree been dead? How long until what remains today no longer does so? Time and nature provided the fertile ground where the tree lived, performing its job of helping keep the surrounding soil stabilized thus allowing the other plant and animal life to also thrive for a moment. When men came along, they harvested the trees and, in their wake, left the hillside torn to shreds. A fire could have just as easily done the bidding of mankind by disrupting the balance, so in some ways, all things are equal. The flames that catch hold of dry terrain don’t consume out of greed or malice, while we hardly have the patience to work sustainably and will move against nature and our own best interests.
The lessons are all around us: live symbiotically within your environment, and your place on earth will sustain you. We are a reckless species armed with the knowledge that should allow us to know better, and yet we continue with our destructive ways while the information abounds but is ignored. We too often deride those as kooks and crackpots who advocate for a healthy attitude towards planetary well-being and recently have lumped scientists into the same bag. Yet nature continues while the biped that claims superiority lives with poor intentions and worse practices.
Whenever we find ourselves away from home in any of Earth’s biomes, we have to stop and look deep into its ecosystems and reflect on how unnatural we live in comparison. True, we have 7 billion fellow humans with complex needs and a kind of mobility that no other species can claim. Collectively, we have the skills, knowledge, and, more importantly, the need to make our nest the most healthy and beautiful place it can be, just like this little garden of moss and lichen perched on the edge of a fallen log that is thriving and apparently doing well to my untrained eye.
Islands of hope are where restoration begins. The engineers and scientists who worked to rebuild these wetlands had to dig channels that would allow an exchange of waters in an area that had long been fouled. Over time opportunistic pockets of life take hold and lay a foundation for further expansion of more complex ecosystem elements until things can fall back into balance, thus negating our previous abuse of the lands along the river.
So, being out here on the South Slough at this stage of its regrowth can be seen as a treasured peek into our futures. The trail forward may be steep, and the damage under repair disheartening. We took things to the brink of total destruction, but there are glimmers that cooler heads will prevail. I remain ambivalent that as I write this and have a desire for more people to take an interest in these lands, there is a consequence of too many of us being personal witnesses as we often bring more damage.
In front of us is the network of water veins and grasses that filter the environment and thus do the bulk of the work in restoring this system back to equilibrium. Knowledge within people works much the same way, but where we can use a bulldozer to move earth around, we haven’t found an equivalent tool to move stupidity out of the way of the masses. At this point, my hope for our species takes a nosedive, as I’m afraid we’ll have to nearly extinct ourselves before restoration is able to take place.
A bridge as a metaphor is needed here, along with a spark that ignites hope that our way ahead is achievable. Will we flow with the river of life or fight the current of survival with outmoded, archaic thinking that places the will of humanity in the hands of an unseen deity that has failed to show its face to any of the 7 billion souls on earth that require a healthy thriving planet? Why are we diseased with this lack of will to knowledge at this critical juncture in our evolution? How have we been so corrupted by our embrace of blind stupidity masquerading as some kind of perverted intelligence? Is that the sound of Nero fiddling while the fire roars?
Time to leave the frying pan and flames behind and head somewhere else, like up this grassy knoll over to the beach here at Gearhart. My aching desire to find beauty and drag others to help celebrate what we have before we lay waste in such a totality that we’ll never again be able to crest the hillside is a burden I can’t tell you that I love. I do wish I could leave my concern behind and go about every waking moment blind to everything other than my own existence and happiness, but I don’t seem to have the DNA to muster that disregard.
Even though the day may be gray and blustery with the threat of the tempest beyond the horizon, I still have something worth celebrating in the most joyous way.
That celebration is found in the incredible love Caroline and I share, where our smiles are genuine and heartfelt. I believe that we equally enjoy the sensation and elation of each other’s touch and presence. We comfort one another in hugs, and the spark in our eyes allows us to look forward to another day indulging in the beauty of the world we are exploring. Maybe it’s my dream for others in love to one day share in the wonder of seeing the magnificence that can be had walking through their world and being witness to things large and small, beautiful and stupendous that motivates these musings.
When all else fails in saving the planet, there’s always more yarn. Welcome to Seaside Yarn & Fiber, which just opened this past October here in Seaside, Oregon. This nice little shop is next door to a bakery, and next to it is Beach Books. After collecting more yarn, we headed to the bookstore, where Alexa, a very enthusiastic bookworm herself, recommended we grab a copy of Rising Out of Hatred by Eli Saslow. Her solid endorsement convinced us, and with it as one of three books we bought, she asked that we reach back to her and let her know our thoughts when we finish it. We will.
Into Cannon Beach, we had enough time for yet another yarn store and even more yarn. If you are thinking that we are running out of room in the car for anything else, you’d likely be right. This isn’t our first time to many of these yarn stores, and here at Coastal Yarns we once again leave with sock yarn that will one day likely grace my feet.
Before dinner, I finally dragged this small fragment of my synth out of the trunk and played with a patch for a short while. By the time we were stuffed to the gills following dinner, I was hardly able to focus on a return to playing with knobs and patch cables and instead allowed thoughts of the cozy bed to lure me to another great night of coastal sleep and dreaming.