On the Beach

North of Kalaloch, July 2005

Work today, work tomorrow, after work tomorrow hit the road to the northern WA coast beaches where the seastacks are troll sentinels and the woods are so dark the moon asks to hold the sun's hand. Sleeping in a tent with J will we hear strange night beasties stalking and creeping about our campground, will we grasp our flashlights and bear sprays with white knuckled grips as the rain forest moves about us?

I love the wildness of the WA coast, all jagged cliffs and eroding stacks and surf and driftwood piled like the toy sticks of some toddler from a race of giants - all random and stacked roughly, cantilevered crazy. The richness of the smells, the pulse of the breakers, brown pelicans like hellbirds flying low and slow (the regular reader knows brown pelicans creep me the hell out), bald eagles, brightly colored tangles of fish nets and always the forest. 

You can have your flat sandy expanses of beachdom with rental horses and scooters and wifebeater clad thugs and their girlfriends and noisy kids and homeboys (see: Seaside, Oregon or Ocean Shores, WA) I want isolated beaches you find after hiking through rainforest until the wizened shore trees give way to views that stop your breath, to beaches that will never see a minivan dripping oil into the sand.  I am a beach snob/purist like that, even though I certainly will go to the others but they are weekend fun beaches not vacation beaches. When I vacate I wanna vacate.

Where are your favorite ocean beaches?
  

 

Comments

[chip]

cocoa beach, florida-great surfing

[sunny]

I'm with you Bob - give me that isolated beach out on the Washington Coast - the one with the rope ladder you have to climb over in the pouring rain to pass at high tide.
Enjoy - - watch out for those Vampires from Forks and the Werewolves from LaPush..........

[Diana Davies]

Tropical island beaches. I once wandered on to a secluded beach in Costa Rica and found myself to be embarrasingly overdressed.

A bunch of naked people frolicking in the sand and surf somehow didn't look right, and it was obvious that God intended us to wear clothes in public.

[John]

Once again, your musical taste..I bet that you have a wall-long, ceiling high vinyl collection too! Oh yea, entertaining morning read as usual. Cheers man.

[Cowgirl]

I don't have to tell you where my favorite beach is, man, you already stole it! When I was a kid we'd head up to LaPush in October for a cheap offseason weekend. We'd rent one of the A-Frames and go for rainy windswept walks on the beach up to the hole in the rock, cook chili and drink hot cocoa and play board games, all to the smell of salt air and the sound of heavy surf. Good times.

[Beary G.]

Great music selection. We love the Ramones at our house.

The picture of the bridge is gorgeous as well.

Nice post.

[green libertarian]

There's a couple beaches on the NE coast of Maui before Hana that I REALLY liked. Tropical forest and waterfalls with pools right to the beach.

[Kurt]

Ocean Shores, just down the road from Aberdeen.