Butterfield Oregon Coast Trip (Day 3)

 Saturday morning (Aug 7th) everyone split up to do their own things. Ricky and Jenna went with us to go find a beach with sand that we could walk down to. On the way out of Depoe Bay we saw a lookout area so we pulled over to check it out. There was no access to a beach but we were fortunate enough to see a whale in the distance several times! We would wait to see a spray of water and then the whale would surface so we could see the top of it. 

This was the first time we saw the sun since arriving in Depoe Bay. It was a nice break from all the clouds and fog.

Can you see the little spray of water back there? That's our whale!

We continued to drive a little further until we found another spot to pull over that had a sandy beach. We parked and hiked down some steps (which was beautiful) to get down to the beach. I was the only one who wore sandals so that I could walk in the sand and water. Some of the sand was nice and soft but most of it was bigger pieces of sand that didn't bother my feet at first but after awhile it bugged me. It was still a beautiful spot. 

Silly brothers

We found a couple of little crabs in the rocks. I think it's actually called a rock crab.

Saw this tree and had to get a picture under it.

Hmmm, crazy how nature does these things.

Our next adventure for the 4 of us was to go horse back riding but we had time to back to the house to eat and for me to change clothes before heading over to Lincoln City for our ride. The place we went to was called Rock Creek Stables. We were originally going to go with Amber and Casey also but they had called and said they didn't have enough people working to be able to go with 6 riders. Amber and Casey decided to bow out since they had already paid to go crabbing the day before. Out of the 4 of us that went I was apparently the most experienced rider. I had gone on two other horse back trail rides in the last 5 years. Curtis went on one of those but the other he stayed back to watch Charlotte who was only 4 years old at the time. Ricky and Jenna had never been on a trail ride and maybe sat on a horse once or twice a long time ago. The people who worked here were very nice and did a good job but unfortunately Jenna just did not have the right confidence and ended up falling off her horse toward the beginning of the ride. It was a good thing that they made all of us wear helmets. Her horse saw Ricky's horse start to go faster and so her horse went faster to where it was running a bit and Jenna fell off. I think it really scared her when the horse started going fast and she didn't remember to pull back on the reins to stop the horse. Fortunately she was just bruised and sore, nothing broken but she had decided that she was done after that and waited for the rest of us. They were able to take her back to the corral on a truck and get her checked out. Meanwhile, the rest of us carried on. We had one guide at the front of the line and one at the end of the line. When we got up the mountain a little ways it started to rain lightly. It started to cover my sunglasses. At the top we stopped for pictures and let Ricky switch to his cowboy hat just for pictures. On the way down I finally had to have the guide carry my sunglasses because they were getting to wet to see well. They said this is the first time it's rained in a month. There were a few times on this ride where even my horse scared me, almost running me into trees and what not. Her name was Rosy and she kept wanting to be up in front when we were in the middle but it was still a fun ride.

We made it to the top. Curtis and I had brought hats to wear but when they said to wear a helmet we just left our hats back at the beginning in a tub bucket. Ricky had a back pack to carry his in.

Riding Rosy and Neo

Feeding the horses treats after the ride and giving them love.

I think he was hoping I had some treats.

After getting back to the house from our horse back ride we hung out for a bit playing games and working on a new puzzle that John and Shauna had bought. This one was more difficult because of the colors in it as it was an African animal scene. Then we had to find a restaurant that was willing to take all 14 of us. We found one South of us in Newport (which is the same town we did our shopping in) and were able to get in just before closing time. Many people in Oregon were wearing masks but at the time it was not mandatory for any place that we went. It was like going back in time because almost nobody wears masks in Idaho. Although, now a couple weeks after our trip more people in Idaho are wearing them again.

The upper level of the house had a game room with ping pong, pool, and foosball with some sitting furniture. I think the only game that was played was ping pong. This is Casey and Curtis.

Curtis and Shauna

Others down below working on the 2nd puzzle.

Curtis liked to read his book (The Lord of the Rings) at the end of the day. I caught him asleep while holding his book. I brought my book but I preferred working on the puzzles. This was a bedroom with two full beds. We just pushed them together to make a big king size bed. We also had a bunk bed in our room that we used to hold our luggage.

It was a busy and adventurous Saturday and we were ready to slow down for Sunday to enjoy the Sabbath.