Lighthouses! (Hecta Head, Coquille)

From Beverly Beach we headed south on 101 to go as far as we wanted and find a place to stay for the night. On the way, I got a little happy with my camera and these tunnel-vision pictures were the result! Kind of neat, but I'm not sure how I did it in the first place so I think it would be hard for me to do again, haha!

We happened to see a sign for Hecta Head Lighthouse State Recreational Area, and luckily there was a rest area just past the turn-off. So, as we were preparing for the short hike down the park road, I stepped out and noticed something wrong...

Hmmmm....Sean was sure he had locked the compartment and with further inspection, it was in fact locked, but just wasn't closed properly. There is a ton of bicyclist on the road, so we are constantly passing the bikers as we drive, and luckily (as far as we know) none of them whacked by the unruly compartment door...

The park road leads down to a beach area with beautiful views, but we were a little perplexed because the lighthouse (we had read about at this location and it is supposed to be one of the most photographed lighthouses on the Oregon coast) was obscured from view by many trees.

Then, after seeing a couple walking in what looked like the middle of the hillside, we found a trail leading up to the Light Keeper's House and further on to the Lighthouse.

We stopped in the next town to fuel up, and being in Oregon you are unable to pump your own vehicle's fuel, so there are attendants available at each gas station. This is something so hard for us to get used to, and on many occasions we start the process without a second thought until the attendant disapprovingly looks at us, haha!

We got to Bullard's Beach State Park and decided to stay the night there. This park can definitely keep you busy with beach access, some off-road trails, a retired lighthouse, and many places to walk. Sean and I found ourselves a bit tired just walking the campground roads!

We decided to head out to the Coquille River Lighthouse since sunset wasn't too far off. We found much more than just the lighthouse to explore with the river's jetty going quite a way down the river, so we had lots of fun hiking to the end of the jetty and climbing through driftwood debris just to get there. After all the work, it was definitely worth it and turned out to be a very romantic scene...