Today, my husband and I are making the three-hour drive to Cannon Beach, Oregon. This is the annual pilgrimage we look forward to all year long, the few days spent in paradise with our extended family.
Most years, we visit the brewery and each of the several coffee roasters and sit for long hours, enjoying both the view and la vita dolce. This year we plan to do more than window-shop in the numerous art galleries. We have a wall in our new apartment that needs art. Of course, we will spend time in the local bookstores.
On Hemlock, the main street in town, tourists can find a fabulous wine shop, my all-time favorite bakery, and an old-fashioned candy factory—yum! We might go to a play at the Coaster Theater, and for sure, we will have at least one pizza night.
On years when we have grandchildren visiting, the most beloved store sits just around the corner from our condo – Geppetto’s. This small but magical place is every child’s favorite toy store. I can’t walk past it without stopping in. This store has a large stock of various board games and puzzles to keep everyone busy when the weather is more like fall than summer.
The weather is often cold and wet here, and while we hope for sunshine, we’re prepared for cold and rain. We who vacation on the coasts of Oregon and Washington expect at least one day of darkness, fog, or rain. After all, we are on the eastern rim of the Northern Pacific, and the weather blows in with all its force.
I love the view from the porch of our rented condo, a place we come back to year after year. Tillamook Head is just off to the north. Only a mile straight out to sea, Terrible Tilly rests atop a sea stack of basalt. She is the notorious Tillamook Rock Lighthouse, a stalwart beacon with a long history of strife and tragedy.
Although long closed to the public, she still stands proud, despite being battered and bruised. Her continued existence is a testament to the quality of construction, as Tilly is much stouter than the rock she was built upon.
About Terrible Tilly, from Wikipedia:
In September 1879, a third survey was ordered, this time headed by John Trewavas, whose experience included the Wolf Rock lighthouse in England. Trewavas was overtaken by large swells and was swept into the sea while attempting a landing, and his body was never recovered. His replacement, Charles A. Ballantyne, had a difficult assignment recruiting workers due to the widespread negative reaction to Trewavas’ death, and a general desire by the public to end the project. Ballantyne was eventually able to secure a group of quarrymen who knew nothing of the tragedy, and was able to resume work on the rock. Transportation to and from the rock involved the use of a derrick line attached with a breeches buoy, and in May 1880, they were able to completely blast the top of the rock to allow the construction of the lighthouse’s foundation.
On October 21, 1934, the original lens was destroyed by a large storm that also leveled parts of the tower railing and greatly damaged the landing platform. Winds had reached 109 miles per hour (175 km/h), launching boulders and debris into the tower, damaging the lantern room and destroying the lens. The derrick and phone lines were destroyed as well. After the storm subsided, communication with the lighthouse was severed until keeper Henry Jenkins built a makeshift radio from the damaged foghorn and telephone to alert officials.
The lighthouse was decommissioned in 1957 and replaced with a whistle buoy, having become the most expensive U.S. lighthouse to operate. During the next twenty years, the lighthouse changed ownership several times; in 1980 a group of realtors purchased the lighthouse and created the Eternity at Sea Columbarium, which opened in June of that year. After interring about 30 urns, the columbarium‘s license was revoked in 1999 by the Oregon Mortuary and Cemetery Board and was rejected upon reapplication in 2005.
Access to the lighthouse is severely limited, with a helicopter landing the only practical way to access the rock, and it is off-limits even to the owners during the seabird nesting season. The structure was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1981 and is part of the Oregon Islands National Wildlife Refuge. [1]
I will spend a lot of time on the porch, thinking, writing, and looking out to sea at my lighthouse friend. I know there will be at least two days of glorious skies, a shade of blue impossible to adequately describe.
Despite its name, the many moods of the Pacific Ocean are anything but peaceful. It is a wild, beautiful thing and is never the same two days running. The waves crashing against the sea stacks at Tillamook Head and the cries of the sea birds combine with the wind, sounds that clear my mind, making it easier to picture what I want to write.
Over the years, I have taken some exceptional photographs of the many wonders along this stretch of Oregon’s coast. I have also taken a million others that were not so good, but they remind us why, like the sea birds we love so much, we return every year. The image of Haystack rock below is from Wikipedia.
Each year I watch the everchanging weather as it blows in, imagining stories about the pelicans and other seabirds who hang out on the sandbar opposite our condo.
Greg and I are drawn to places near water, especially the ocean. This year, Parkinson’s won’t keep him from having a good time. We have a new beach walker with fat tires to help him get down to the waves. Since 2020, when he fell into the sea and was rescued by a group of women, he hasn’t been able to roam the beach.
When we see our avian friends returning to Haystack Rock and the other sea stacks along this beach, we are both stricken with wonder, the stark realization of our beautiful world. When our short vacation ends, we will carry that feeling of wonder home.
And when NaNoWriMo arrives in the dark, rainy depths of a Northwestern November, I will have this slice of summer to warm and inspire me.
Credits and Attributions:
Image: Tillamook Rock Lighthouse, © Connie J. Jasperson 2022
All other images used in this post are courtesy of Wikipedia. Wikipedia contributors, “Haystack Rock,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Haystack_Rock&oldid=1162829510 (accessed July 3, 2023).
[1] Wikipedia contributors, “Tillamook Rock Light,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tillamook_Rock_Light&oldid=1140232117 (accessed July 3, 2023).
Life in the Realm of Fantasy 