Florence, OR

This morning we headed south on US 101 by car after about 30 miles we came upon the Umpqua River Light House. This light house marks the area where the Umpqua River reaches the Ocean. This river is navigable about 30 miles upstream by fairly large vessels. This is a carbon copy of the Heceta Head light house. It is still an active light house and there is a really good museum located here in one of the original light keepers residences. This is in the Oregon Sand Dunes area so it is very sandy here. In 1861 and 1863 floods severely eroded the sandy hill where it was located and it was deemed unsafe. In the winter of 1863 crews very carefully removed the lens and equipment, it then toppled into the ocean in Feb. of 1864. It was not rebuilt until 30 years later when they decided that the traffic up and down the river justified it.

The Oregon sand dunes are along the ocean from here at Florence to about 150 miles further south. They are constantly changing due to the constantly moving sand. About 50% of them are set aside for the use of off road vehicles. We saw hundreds of them using them today. After having a late lunch in a little cafe along the pier in Winchester we spent an hour or so going through the Umpqua river Discovery Center.