Thursday February 5, 2015 Arizona Beach Oregon
Last night was spent in my van under the trees. I could tell it was raining out by all the big drops raining off the trees and hitting the top of my van and making much noise. If it was just rain drops hitting the van roof, it would have been just right, but no, it was these huge drops rolling off the trees overhead. Needless to say, I didn’t sleep very well. I don’t usually sleep well on the first night out anyway.
The rain stopped for a bit at day light, so I stayed in bed a couple extra hours. I got going and was on the dirt road out around ten thirty. As I cleared the trees it started to rain again and continued for the rest of the day and even now.
Brookings is just above where I camped on the Winchuck River, so the fuel tank was filled there and I continued up highway 101 to a place just below Port Orford, Arizona Beach.
I pulled into Arizona Lodge looking for Steve as I knew he was staying there. He wasn’t there, but was out crabbing, so I made arrangements to stay here for a bit. About ten minutes later Steve shows up empty handed. He didn’t catch any legal crab to eat. Bummer.
Steve suggested we don our rain gear and go for a little walk up the Arizona Beach which is a state day use area right next to where we were staying.
It was raining lightly to medium as we got to the beach and it looked like this, except you can’t see the rain. We headed on up the beach.
We walked up the beach until we had to turn around and head back as they lock the gate at five PM. This is what it looked like when we turned around to head on back. I’m using my hand to keep the rain off the lens.
When we got back to the lodge, I retired to my van and cooked up some dinner, did some resting and then checked the Wi-Fi signal to the lodge. It turned out very good out here, better than in the lodge. I read some email and checked the weather, which looks like mostly rain for the rest of the week.
Now, I’m sitting nice and cozy in the old van typing this blog which is almost finished and the rest of the evening, I may do some reading as I brought some Louis Lamour books with me and one kayaking book.
The rain has picked up a bit this evening with gusts of wind rocking the van from time to time, which I like much better than those big drops of water hitting the van last night.
Tomorrow it’s supposed to rain so I’m thinking it might be a good day to do some exploring up in the forest on one of the roads that go up along the Elk River, looking around for more camp spots. We’ll see what plan develops in the morning, depending on the weather.
