Daytripping: Mt. Hood National Forest

A week after returning from the beach we were invited to spend some time on the Clackamas River in the Mt. Hood National Forest with some friends. We jumped at the chance to spend more time near water and be outdoors.

We had attempted to arrange a picnic with a small BBQ, but forgot to bring the travel hibachi. But not to worry the mini-mart on Route 224 had disposable instant BBQs for sale. We were skeptical at first, but it was awesome. As was Alder Flats on the River. After hiking in a mile through gorgeous old growth forest we arrived to the beautiful river. We spent the afternoon admiring how beautiful the area was, swimming around large rocks, drinking beer, having hot dogs riverside and soaking up every last minute summer had to offer. A typical Oregon summer afternoon, wish we could have days like this anytime we wanted.

Buena Vista Beach House

I'm sure by now you've heard as much as you wanted to about our birthday beach week with family. But after looking at our photos I realized the Buena Vista Beach house needed a post of its own. You can see the specifics about the beach house here.

The Rockaway beach house had many of the criteria we wanted: enough rooms that no one had to share, a fenced yard for the dogs, an open kitchen/dining/tv area with a dining table that comfortably sat 10, a game room with a ping pong table, a block from the beach, a deck the length of the top floor looking towards the ocean, and plenty of space for us all.

What to do at Rockaway Beach

Rockaway Beach is a beach town sandwiched between two bays - Nehalem & Tillamook, which sometimes can make the area cloudy when just north or south a few minutes on HWY 101, the sky clears and the sun is out. With a strange railroad track separating the highway from the beach area and very little charm to the town itself, Rockaway can easily be missed. But we found the low-key beach area and great proximity to other beach towns (in case you needed to buy some party decorations, get fresh seafood or find a large capacity laundrymat) to be a great location to spend a full week on the Oregon Coast with family.

The beach wasn't ever really crowded, but there was always people around.

Having dogs definitely made it a priority to go to the beach daily, but we also went to the beach to play bocce ball.

And roast marshmallows on a beach fire.

Our family really likes to play tennis and we managed to squeeze three trips to the tennis court in cute-as-can-be Manzanita.

We spent a majority of our time together, leisurely gathering to play dominoes, ping pong and games found in the beach house.It really was exactly how we wanted to spend this special time together.

Daytripping: Crabbing on the Oregon Coast

We didn't plan many activities during our beach birthday vacation, but one thing we did plan to do was go crabbing. Fresh crabs is a real treat and catching/eating them within a few hours is not to be missed. We arrived early at the Marina Jetty early in the morning when it was foggy and eerie.

After getting all our equipment and a quick run down of the boat, areas to stay away from and how to get unstuck if you end up on a sand bar, this motley crew was ready to catch some crabs!

If you've never gone boat crabbing, it is so much fun. It is mellow and leisurely due the sandy bottom jetties/bays where crabs live. We would toss out a crab ring and then tool around the jetty for bay-level-views of the sandbar in the calm waters.

Then came the real action, time to pull up those rings, filled with crabs, some may say it was like shooting crabs in a ring!

After 2 hours we were ready to return to the dock and cook up the crabs we caught. A boat returning when we arrive was overflowing with crabs, but we only manage to catch 1 crab per person (males only!) but that yielded so much crab meat we're kind of glad we didn't catch any more.

Now with as many crabs as we caught, it could have easily taken the same amount of time it took to catch these suckers to pick out all the meat, but we had professionals and this was done in record amount of time.

Actually I think it took longer to make post-crabbing Bloody Marys. Ours had homemade dilly beans, fresh picked crab meat and smoked oysters.

Here's to boat crabbing on the Oregon Coast, the most rewarding leisure activity out there!

Dogs and the Beach

We don't have dogs, but everyone else in our family does and it was so fun to see these little fur babies go bonkers over a little salt, sand and sea.

The only female, or bitch of the group, was the only one well-behaved enough to go off leash, which meant hours of fetch with anything, especially smooth round rocks, ocean be damned!

We had to leave all the doggies at home when we planned on playing games on the beach, such as frisbe or bocce ball, because it was all a game to them.

They were adorable off the beach too, crashing where ever due to exhaustion, especially if a free dog bed was in sight.

Or where ever it was warm and comfortable.

But by far their favorite place was the beach, even if they had just gotten back from a long walk, and it wasn't uncommon to be faced with this look right after a trip to beach begging for more.

It was so much fun to see them run around all crazy, chomping at the waves, chasing other dogs and trying to chase people. If you have a dog definitely take them to the beach, and often. Best. Therapy. Ever.

I have no idea what's going here and Barley doesn't seemed phased by it at all. Must be the ocean air.