Trip Report: Hiking Ecola State Park on the Oregon Coast
When:
11/03/2018
Location:
Ecola State Park
Conditions:
Temperatures were in the mid-50s, raining throughout the day, cloudy. Everything was wet, dripping, and beautiful! Fog rolling around the shore, up through the trees!
Duration:
We hiked for the better part of the day, up through the park, exploring the beaches.
Difficulty:
The trails were muddy, sometimes a little slippery, but only in the way that made a good day hike feel like a great adventure. Nothing was dangerous, but hiking along the edge of the cliffs on the shore felt incredible, as did lumbering over a fallen tree to keep pushing down the trails! Otherwise, that access was great. Even getting down Crescent Beach you could either curve down a trail or take the stairs.
Kid Friendly:
Yes!
Pet Friendly:
Definitely. Plenty of pets roaming around.
Usefull links: oregonstateparks.org
The Full Report:
As an introduction to the Pacific Northwest shoreline, Ecola State Park could not have been a better choice! As a recent transplant from Minnesota, I have never experienced the rainforests of the PNW and wanted to see them as quickly as I could upon arriving. For five dollars, we drove up to the Ecola Point parking lot - and if we had done nothing else but driven the road into the parking lot and then left, we would have gotten our money's worth! The road gives a great feel for the terrain of the shoreline, curving up and down and around monstrous trees, giving little peeks at the waterfront as you drive closer to the Point.
Definitely worth doing more than just driving through. Ecola Point is a great base for adventures, with a lovely view of the water, picnic tables for lunch, and bathrooms. After getting situated, we hiked south along the Crescent Beach trail. The trail winds south, moving up and down the hills of the shore, pocketed with giant trees to hug, vistas of the incredible ocean, and a seemingly endless rainforest playground to run through. The trail in total is 1.25 miles south until it meets the road again, but without going quite that distance you can get yourself down to Crescent Beach. The beach by itself is an incredible place to be. There is plenty of room to run, huge rocks to explore, and piles of driftwood to build into forts. We spent a good amount of time looking around, freezing our toes while looking at anemones in the tidal area, and climbing sand piles. Even with the rain coming down, we stayed warm moving quickly on the trail, and despite some mud, there were only a few washed out spots along the way. All in all, the trail was super accessible, and didn't waste any time providing us with an incredible taste of the Oregon coast.
The Full Report:
As an introduction to the Pacific Northwest shoreline, Ecola State Park could not have been a better choice! As a recent transplant from Minnesota, I have never experienced the rainforests of the PNW and wanted to see them as quickly as I could upon arriving. For five dollars, we drove up to the Ecola Point parking lot - and if we had done nothing else but driven the road into the parking lot and then left, we would have gotten our money's worth! The road gives a great feel for the terrain of the shoreline, curving up and down and around monstrous trees, giving little peeks at the waterfront as you drive closer to the Point.
Definitely worth doing more than just driving through. Ecola Point is a great base for adventures, with a lovely view of the water, picnic tables for lunch, and bathrooms. After getting situated, we hiked south along the Crescent Beach trail. The trail winds south, moving up and down the hills of the shore, pocketed with giant trees to hug, vistas of the incredible ocean, and a seemingly endless rainforest playground to run through. The trail in total is 1.25 miles south until it meets the road again, but without going quite that distance you can get yourself down to Crescent Beach. The beach by itself is an incredible place to be. There is plenty of room to run, huge rocks to explore, and piles of driftwood to build into forts. We spent a good amount of time looking around, freezing our toes while looking at anemones in the tidal area, and climbing sand piles. Even with the rain coming down, we stayed warm moving quickly on the trail, and despite some mud, there were only a few washed out spots along the way. All in all, the trail was super accessible, and didn't waste any time providing us with an incredible taste of the Oregon coast.