Our most recent trip was an inadvertent study of parking on the
coast. It varies from places where there is no fee and plenty of parking
and places that are relatively expensive. We took a bit longer and more
scenic route to Cape Lookout State Park this time. We went south and
west to Otis and ended up at Sitka Sedge Nature area, which only opened
to the public in 2018. It had been part of a farm that investors had
wanted to turn into an expensive golf club.

"The 365 acre Sitka Sedge State Natural Area was officially opened to
the public in June 2018. Originally part of a farm where cattle were
grazed, this expanse of wetland, mud flats, and dunes was purchased by
wealthy investors who hoped to create an elite golf course here, one of
those that require a $25,000 or so annual membership. Local and
environmental groups mounted a decade-long opposition to the proposal,
and eventually the investors sold out to Ecotrust, a West Coast group
committed to environmental and social change. The land was then
purchased through an agreement with the State of Oregon using lottery
funds. The trail network here begins with a walk along a farm dike, and
then involves two short loops through a vegetated dunescape with access
both to the shallow Sand Lake Estuary and the beach north of Tierra del
Mar (see the Sand Lake-Cape Kiwanda Hike).

The state park is named after Carex aquatilis var. dives, which is also
common in the Cascades. Elk graze on Sitka sedge as do cattle. The juicy
bases of the stems were consumed by Native Americans, who also used the
tough leaves in basket making. However, the most common sedge in the
park is probably the slough sedge (Carex obnupta), which dominates up
and down the Coast and in the western Oregon lowlands.

The ADA-accessible half-mile Beltz Dike Trail begins behind the
information kiosk, which displays a large map showing the trail system. You’re hiking along a dike built in the 1920s. To your left are
freshwater wetlands where Reneke and Beltz Creeks run into the Sand Lake Estuary. The dike effectively shut off saltwater tide flows into this
area, and allowed Farmer Beltz to establish wet meadows for grazing
cattle. The two tide gates are now deteriorating and are no longer
functioning as they were intended, so salt marsh plants are beginning to establish themselves once again. Red alder and Sitka spruce shade the
trail in places, and elderberry, salal, evergreen huckleberry, black
twinberry, evergreen blackberry, and western spiraea form thickets along
the banks of the dike. To your right, you’ll see the vast expanse of the shallow Sand Lake Estuary, where sand bars and mud flats are exposed at
low tide."

https://www.oregonhikers.org/field_guide/Sitka_Sedge_Loop_Hike

It sounds like the investment group was at least a decade too late
for that site.

There is no fee there. It has permanent restrooms and resident volunteers. Just about every place you go you run into volunteers. This
was a cheerful couple with a nice RV parked behind a fence on the other
side of the road. Pretty much all of them have nice RVs.

From there we ended eventually ended up in Pacific City, which is
famous for its "Dory fleet".

https://tillamookcoast.com/what-to-do/dory-fishing-fleet-dory-days/

There was a little very popular free parking there and a LOT of
"no parking" signs. The county has a big parking lot right in the middle
of town. I can't complain too much about their $10 daily fee for using
their parking lots. Their whole camping/parking system pays for itself.
So the people who pay to park in Pacific city probably helped pay for
some of my camping trips. This is a busy one and most of the County's
parking lots are in strategic locations. When I'm staying in their
campgrounds I get a parking pass good for their entire system.

Because I'm cheap we wandered a little further up the coast to a
tiny pocket state park that was too small to have any sort of volunteer.
This one mostly exists as a way to drive onto the beach, if you are so inclined. I'm not. I've seen too many vehicles stuck in the sand
somewhere for that. That one was free and only a little north of Pacific
city.

Further north Whalen Island was fun because there's another small
state park, with a resident volunteer, right next to a county park. You
can park for free at the state park. It an official parking spot for the
local shuttle service. At the county park it's $10 for day use parking,
but if you paid in Pacific City or elsewhere, you don't have to pay again.

At Cape Lookout there's a $5 day use fee or you can buy an annual
pass for day use in the state parks for $30. Naturally this is covered
by your camping fee. This time of year the day use area is very pleasant because it's only lightly used. Most of the people camping there use the
beach access a bit further north and closer to the camping sites.

I wouldn't mind these parking fees if we only had to pay one
organization. Naturally every jurisdiction has to have its own system
and fees.

This trip I only did a little crabbing in Garibaldi and caught two
nice size keepers. Recreational crabbing is allowed all year here, but
you can see the effective end of the season coming soon. There are
around a thousand commercial crab traps staged up near our favorite
dock, getting ready for the commercial season. Once that start nice
sized keepers will become a lot harder to find. I saw a likely spot for
shore crabbing that doesn't seem to be well known, so I'll have to give
that a try one of these days.

TB

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