Post PCT - Oregon Coast Trail day 4

August 21, 2022

[Netarts to Three Rocks]

Today followed a natural pattern of 'after an amazing day there comes an average one' it had a great ending though.

First thing in the morning I hiked out along the coastal road from Netarts and followed it right up to the Cape Lookout where I went down to the beach and met my first OTC thru hikers, they were less than excited to see me, especially after I told them about my PCT adventure, we exchanged couple of useful informations (they've been using OCT guidebook to navigate, which I didn't know about) and I carried on walking along the beach.

After a mile or two I reached Sand Lake Recreational Area where all the sand vehicle enthusiasts were having a field day, there were all kinds of off-road machines here, some of them looking like they got here straight from the new Mad Max movie set. I ended up getting lost between sand dunes trying to dodge the riders, it was quite a puzzle to get out of the area and walking in deep sand was making it extremely slow going. Finally I managed to find the way out and got a short hitch at the back of a pick up truck back to highway 101, once here I stuck my thumb up again to skip another big portion of road walking.

Within less than a minute a car stopped and his lively driver Al offered me a ride to precisely the place I wanted to go - Pacific City. Al was a fan of everything heavy and metal, he even knew Polish band called Behemoth, first thing he told me was that he will give me a ride as far as I won't kill him, haha. It was a fun ride and we had the most whacky conversation. Once in Pacific City I went to have a look at the beach and walked two miles downtown to a Shell gas station where I got a coffee and a cheese and pepperoni bake. A local trooper and shop owners seemed to be not particularly happy about my presence, I had to leave my backpack outside and the trooper was hovering in the area until I finished eating and drinking the coffee.

For the above reasons I wrapped up rather quickly and decided to get another ride around the bay area, by accident I managed to catch a local bus. A ride is a ride, I payed 1.50$ fee and got in, bus took me to Neskowin where I got my daily supply of ice-cream, today it was the local Tillamook brand which was very nice but not as elaborate as Ben&Jerry's. Then the last stretch of the hike begun.

I walked about three miles along the busy road until I reached the Rainforest Trailhead, it didn't have the usual Oregon Coast Trail marker underneath but I assumed it had to be part of the network as it was going the right direction. It was quite a steep climb up, during the walk I met a local cyclist Tyler, I asked him about a good place to camp and he gave me the best tip I could ask for which made today so much better. He told me that if I followed an alternative trail called Cascade Head (that was closed during covid and never reopened, but locals were walking it) I will reach the meadow on top of the Three Rocks area, it will add few miles to the trail but he couldn't think of a better place to spend the night. It was documented that native americans were using small island down in the bay for their shamanic rituals and the surrounding area had definitely a peaceful vibe to it. Tyler was right, it was my favourite campsite on the OCT so far, it overlooked a vast area ahead and it was possibly the highest point within 50 miles with nothing obstructing the view. A fantastic end to the otherwise average day, thank you for the tip Ty!

Evening Three Rocks and morning Netarts campsites: