#56 – Coveys Great Adventure – May 2019 – Port Orford OR

May 2019 – Port Orford OR

Spring finally arrived at Cape Blanco, it actually got to 60°! We have promised ourselves LL Bean or Carhartt jackets before we return to the Oregon coast in the spring.

This place may be cold and wet, but the vegetation certainly loves it. You can almost watch stuff grow. We had to get the rangers to bring over a chainsaw to remove limbs that we wouldn’t clear when we left, limbs we easily missed when we arrived.

The (relatively) warm weather certainly brought more visitors. Kayeanne became good at traffic management. As you can imagine, the narrow, winding stairs in the lighthouse quickly became congested, and the constricted spaces in the watch level and the lens room really limits how many people can be in the tower at once. In addition to telling the story of the light keepers duties in the work room, she now had to control the flow up the tower. I could only handle five at a time in the lens room, which limited visitors to just a few minutes to take in the view, ask questions and take a couple of pictures. Firm diplomacy was often required.

We had been waiting impatiently for May 1, opening day for the Port Orford Coast Guard Lifeboat Station Museum. While it doesn’t have the wow-factor of the lighthouse, we really enjoyed our visit. Opened in 1934, the station served the coast for over 30 years. Don't miss it if you visit this area. The Cape Blanco Heritage Society does a great job preserving the site and giving tours. The site is also a state park, and has hiking trails to the beach and several picnic facilities.

The Hughes House also opened the first of May. It was built in 1898 by Patrick Hughes to house his large family. The house was so well built by a local architect and builder that it remains solid over 120 years later. It even has running water, and possibly the first flush toilets in southern Oregon, because he sited the house downhill from a spring that still flows today. Hughes arrived in Port Orford from Ireland in 1860 and built one of the most successful dairy farms in the area. One of his sons, James, was an assistant keeper at the lighthouse for 37 years. Hughes also built a school and hired a teacher for his and the local children. His descendants donated 1600 acres of land to create Cape Blanco State Park.

Battle Rock

We celebrated our anniversary at the Redfish restaurant in Port Orford. We wanted a special evening and a memorable dinner to mark 34 years of marital bliss, and it didn’t disappoint. The food was outstanding and the setting is remarkable. The site overlooks the coast at Battle Rock and Port Orford Head State Park. The owners also own the adjacent art gallery and select pieces are on display in the restaurant, too.

Bandon is about 25 miles north of Port Orford. It is a much larger town with a fully established tourist industry. It isn’t too tacky, though, so we enjoyed visiting it a few times. Don’t miss Tony’s Crab Shack. The fish tacos are the best that we've eaten in a long time. They make their own taco sauce by cooking down the fish bones and adding secret spices. They don’t sell the sauce and they won’t discuss the recipe; I know, I asked.

For dessert, walk a couple of blocks to the Coastal Mist chocolate shop. Leave good sense and restraint at the door. They make everything on site and it’s all delicious. I like chocolate and have eaten a lot of it. This place comes close to the one we found in Quebec City, the best we’ve ever tasted.

The food at The Spoon in Langlois is great, too

Docent work clearly agrees with us. We enjoy camp hosting; we are looking forward to doing it at Nehalem Bay State Park in September for our sixth visit. But learning about new locations and events, and talking with people from all over the world is certainly more interesting than cleaning yurts and fire pits. We are looking forward to taking on more docent assignments in the near future.

We also made new friends. Ray and Leslie moved in next door on May 1 as they transitioned from camp hosts at the state park to lighthouse hosts. We managed to fit in a couple of camp fires between the wind and rain, and discovered that we had a lot to talk about. They are practicing Dudeists, the first religion I have ever heard of that makes any sense at all. I hope they make it to Benson this winter.

At the end of the month we woke up Ripley and headed off to Thompson’s Mills State Heritage Site near Corvallis to learn all we can about the flour mill business in the 19th century in Willamette Valley.

I read a couple of books this month that I really liked:

             Splitting an Order by Ted Kooser (poetry)

             Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

More soon,

Bob