Three Amazing Oregon Coast Spots Locals Don't Want You to Know

Published 03/30/2016 at 3:51 AM PDT
By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Oregon Coast) – An Oregon coast tutorial: how to be in with the “in crowd.” At least when it comes to knowledge of cool secret spots. (Photo: a wondrous hidden spot south of Newport).

Some of the best of these beaches lurk almost in plain sight, but for one reason or another they're not heavily traveled. Sometimes it's because it's hard to find the entrance to a certain beach. Others are hiding behind completely nondescript gravel spots that don't look like anything but a good place to pull over when your cellphone rings.

Check these beauties out. Oh, and shhhh.....they're still a bit of a secret.

Nameless Spot South of Newport. After the South Beach area, it’s a host of winding, twisting spots on the road and residential areas with no beach accesses.

But a set of truly hidden and crescent-shaped dents in the cliffs lie near a hidden beach access about eight miles south of Newport. Look for MP 146, and less than a quarter mile south of that you'll see an unmarked beach access with a gravel patch by the side of the road.

Once on this unnamed beach, you'll find a pleasant stream and a lot of striking sandstone cliffs. But head maybe a quarter of a mile to the south and there's a couple of enchanting rounded-out areas in the cliffs, one of which has a tiny waterfall. There is a tiny stretch of climbable spots above the cliffs next to the beach access.

Bayocean Spit and Its Ghost Town. The Bayocean Spit and the neighboring community of Cape Meares could be the answer if you’re searching for solitude. Bayocean is the spit that encompasses Tillamook Bay, and the entrance to it lies next to the tiny, fairly hidden village of Cape Meares - which sits about a mile or so from the cape known as Cape Meares.

Try the beach accesses at Cape Meares and the Bayocean Spit for a little getaway: wander towards the enormous cliffs to check out the nesting wildlife above and maybe you'll get lucky and find the tide low enough to find the hidden cove.

Or keep walking north to the spit - or take the road a mile into the spit - and hike Bayocean's big, fluffy dunes. This deliciously silent place, where an entire resort once stood, takes a round trip hike of about 3.9 miles if you walk through the sandy draw near the middle and come back around. Or you can hike the entire thing in an eight-mile loop.

Bayocean is a weird remnant of history. There was once a large resort town here, bustling with two hotels, a natatorium, a dance hall of sorts and five miles of roads. Some 4000 lots were created for homes, with perhaps 1600 actually being sold.

All this happened around the 1910’s, with 1913 probably finding the place at its height. But heavy erosion in the area, failed business deals and finally the Great Depression ended the life of what was to be the “Atlantic City of the West.”

By 1952 - when the spit was breached by a really bad winter – its streets were broken and crumbled and the place was a ghost town. A few years later, the government burned and bulldozed the majority of the buildings left. By 1971, the last of the remaining buildings had fallen into the sea.

These days, sandy bluffs are all that’s left and you see no trace of the former resort. Although some locals say you can spot remnants of some parts of the community at extremely low tides – or even leftovers of foundations in shallow parts of the bay and nearby Meares Lake.

Rock Creek Campground and Roosevelt Beach. The Forest Service operates this one, accessible by turning inland on 101, between Florence and Yachats – just south of the Lane County/Lincoln County border. Numerous campsites are nestled in the forest here.

The real discovery is the beach of Roosevlet Beach, however. If you’re not camping here, you can find this gem by looking for a couple of unmarked dusty patches on the side of the road immediately south of a small bridge – and just the other side from the mini headland at Ocean Beach Picnic Ground. You’ll find a long stretch of bluffs which allow you access to Roosevelt Beach at various points.

You’ll find a charming creek spilling into the ocean, and the other side of that headland from Ocean Beach looks strangely identical with a very similar indentation in it. The strand wanders on for a while and disappears out of sight beyond the sandstone bluffs, meanwhile dotted with intriguing rock structures and covered half in stones and half in sand.

It’s a fascinating and enchanting spot, made more so by the fact it’s largely hidden and very unpopulated. Oregon Coast Hotels in these areas - Where to eat - Maps and Virtual Tours

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