Camping on the Oregon coast for a few nights. Driving national forest land in the Siuslaws. Using a recreation pass or northwest forest pass for pay sites on the Oregon coast.
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175 Billy Newman Photo podcast mixdown Northwest Forest Pass For Day Use Site On the Oregon Coast
Hello, and thank you very much for listening to this episode of The Billy Newman photo podcast. Appreciate you guys are tuning in to check this episode out. It’s mid-February right now coming up into it, I guess. Okay, early. And I wanted to talk about a recent trip I did over to the coast. I was out there camping for a couple of days; it was kind of cool. Right now, we’re coming into one of the coldest snaps of weather for the year; as predicted, and I think I was looking at the Oregonian, it was saying, probably expected to be the coldest stretch of winter weather we’ve had since a snap-in February 2014. And I think I remember that went to like probably near like was that snowpocalypse the snowpocalypse that year in February, that was like a week of pretty heavy snow. I don’t know if we’re going there this time. But I think it’s supposed to be a snap of pretty cold weather. I was looking at trying to go camping in Eastern Oregon this week. And all that’s like, like down around like 12 degrees, zero degrees at night. So I’m going to skip that. But yeah, I was looking around here. And it seems like there’s probably some good weather coming up. But it’s still so early in the year. You know, it’s like deep in the wintertime. So my deep campus stuff isn’t set up that much yet. But I wanted to talk about this chip added over to the coast; it was excellent. I did that two days over there. It’s nice in Oregon, or at least on the west coast, and you have the chance to have some days through January, February, and March that feel like springtime for many parts of the country.
I’m sure it would be nicer than a lot of springtime weather. But we had a snapback in the in, and I think it was maybe the end of January where we had like a few days in a row of pretty clear warm weather. So like over on the coastal side, you know, before you get up into higher elevation, the hills. It was like, and I don’t know, it was kind of like 50 degrees around the coast. It was sunny out clear weather, you know, the whole day and stuff. So I went over to the beach, and I was trained to check out a bunch of the Forest Service roads that kind of stretch around through the National Forest system through the site using I think it’s so helpful National Forest system as at least a part of the area that I was around. But yeah, I was trying to check some spots connected to the coast, the highway 101. It was kind of excellent going down and checking it out. I think it went from like to Waldport checked out the Alsea River and some steelhead fishing spots that are getting active right now. I think, like what is it since the first of the month and February and I went for another month and a half or something like that. But you got like strong steelhead season coming through. I think it’s the hatchery fish coming out of the North Fork, steel heads, steelhead Fish Hatchery. And I see people down there, like stacked up all the time. I see many guide boats do a lot of friendly ships on nice aluminum frame boats. I’m wondering, like, well, how did they float that little boat, or you’re like a pretty heavy-duty metal boat down just that little Alsea River out there. Pretty cool that they’re doing it sounds fun. And I’ve seen like, I’ve seen those guys have those really kind of maneuver and pretty amazing ways when they’re out there in pretty tight bits of water. But they’re doing some steelhead efficient stuff out there.
So I saw them when I was driving out. And I have to check that out a little. I was trying to look at a couple of spots and stuff that might be cool to go to. And then I cut up into this useless national forest area I was trying to drive around on the roads up there. Before this break and pretty lovely weather, I noticed that it was only around maybe 35 at night, which is pretty good Low Temp, clear skies, no wind, and about 5055 as a high daytime temperature. So it’s a pretty mild, you know, kind of mid, or you know, like mid-winter temperature to be spent as a time, so that’s what I was trying to make a break for and try and do some camping. And it was just car camping. So it wasn’t like kind of deep woods stuff or anything, but it was still enough to spend a couple of nights out in the woods as it is right now in the wintertime. But one thing I noticed when I got out to the national forests, Devin through some BLM estate for stuff that I traveled through throughout the rest of the trip, I was noticing that there were a lot of downed trees and a lot of downed limbs. The storm that had come through just before then had shaken out is a significant windstorm up here, at least in this section. This section is through the Oregon coast, and I think northern Oregon and South Western Washington. But the wind had knocked down just a ton of smaller branches and big branches and full trees and stuff too. So it’s kind of, you know, the first big wake of it through the year. But I noticed that it was kind of surprised that the National Forest Service crews were out there and BLM crews are out there right away. Still, I saw a bunch of fresh cuts of wood of trees that had fallen through.
They would have obstructed the roadway, and they admit it was probably maybe 48 hours after the storm. They had already come through and cleared out, you know, I don’t know, I drove through like a dozen trees that were downed that, that I wouldn’t have been able to get through, had they not been already chain side out and drag aside and cleared out for people to start driving around again. But outside what was cut down, there were just so many branches that were on the ground, after the drive over pretty, you know, by several other tracks that kind of ground down, I feel pretty safe driving over it. But when they’re brand new like that, they fall, they break. And then if it’s a bridge, if it’s a pretty thin bridge that has, you know, tiny sucker braces that go off to the side of it, is that if that branch breaks, it’ll kind of break crooked. And you’ve probably seen him to where it’ll, it’ll sort of throw up, maybe a two-inch stop on that, on that broken branch. And it’s sharp, and it’s got kind of that acute shear angle to it. And I always have this thought that you know, and there’s so many of them on it that it’s just going to puncture a tire. I have these all-terrain tires on the truck, and they’re pretty good. I hear, and I’ve seen it being stuck proven. They’re better rated; I think they have that steel band or synthesis supposed to be better for, for taking punctures and stuff on rough roads, like in situations like this, which is excellent, but still like a two-inch hardwood piece is you know, just freshly falling from a tree it’s not been messed around or ground down or anything just kind of worries me driving over some of those, some of those pieces of the bolt out of the woods with a flat tire before you know it’s a slow leak or something like that, that takes a bit of time.
So I know it can happen, and definitely, it’s right here can be difficult with one of those. What I’ve heard before, though, is that damage to the tire’s sidewall is more problematic when you’re doing stuff in the woods than the just like puncture stuff. I guess punctures happen a lot. But I think you get your kind of like stride and squeeze through, and you’ll get like a stick or a branch or something that’ll drag or catch the sidewall of the tire you don’t like roll over the whole way. And then that’ll want to rip, rip it down on the side. And I guess that’ll cause a faster flat than anything else. But I have a spare in the back that I prefer not to try to put on right now. But I got a spare and stuff if I need it. A lot of times in the past, I’ve not been as lucky to have that kind of whole setup. Remember, like the Camry, I think I had a spare in it, but it was just a two-wheel drive car. So it was a difficult thing to take around and stuff I talked about stories about that I like not being able to take out to many places that I’d wanted to before. So it did well while I had it, but I’m happy to have the truck and stuff and have the canopy set up in the back, so I was able to kind of set that up and camp in the back. But I was able to sort of bounce around into this useless National Forest and then bounce over to some of the coastal parks that were there on the highway one on one as I was traveling south. One thing I got this December that I tried to use a lot more this year is this recreation pass I got this Northwest forest. Wet recreation passes and thinks they’re 30 bucks. You can pick them up at many shops and stuff the solder passes and licenses, but I picked this one up.
I think it’s suitable for National Forest Service lands in Oregon and Washington, which is fantastic, so you can go to both of those places and try and check out some spots, and I noticed that, yeah, a lot of the sites that are along the Oregon coast. Here is divided between Oregon State Park zones to go to these day-use areas and national forest parks campgrounds. And then I think there’s also city parks and county parks as you get closer to like you know little civilized down sections and stuff, but it’s. It’s kind of cool, though. Yeah, when I was over, there’s a lot of these beaches that you can drive into that is national forest, but they say that there’s like day-use parking passes required, and it’s usually some fee like $7 or something to date at the polling Park good days pass and move on. And I think that would be able to be used at a bunch of the different, you know, a single day operates past views and many parks along the stretch of land on the coast. But what was remarkable was picking up this recreation passes Northwest forest pass heading over to the beach to do that camping stuff. And then as I pull into this day, use areas and my key, so I was free to enter, and I could kind of cruise down to the beach and check some stuff out then pop back up to the track and then cruise down to the next day’s back. I check out the beach there and then sort of poke around, see what was there, and then head back up to the truck.
And now that it’s January and February, I’m trying to go around and try and find some stuff like that’s like washed up on the beach, a lot of big logs and driftwood and stuff that’s come in off the ocean and rolled up on to the stunning shore. But I was kind of trying to go around and scout out for some stuff. I’ve also been trying to look around for remarkable rocks and stuff too. And he spends more time trying to do the agate hunting stuff. And it is good to find like the specific locations and the creeks and draws Riga, you’re going to see a deposit of agate or quartz, or whatever that kind of mineral stone that you’re trying to try to, to hound is at but otherwise you just kind of find whatever rocks are there. Which is cool, but sometimes I want to try and get specific. I want to get some agate; I think it’d be kind of fun to try and score some this winter why the other gravel beds are exposed, and stuff is cool. But yeah, I was driving down south there. I was trying to check out some different spots that kind of popped up, I guess up into the mountains on the side of that drive up into the Forest Service roads into the say useless and the train checkouts of different spots to see if there are any areas to do some car camping and stuff not a lot of big campgrounds or develop spots. However, the roads do kind of travel around for a while even in that not a lot of sites to pull out and do any you know sort of overnight car camping stuff, but some people are doing it not a lot of people through the wintertime here. I think I saw one other guy out in like a camper van, or you know, sort of low-end van life kind of Van does or what I was doing. Yeah, doing some January driving down the coast gave it in the van or as I am caving in the track and then getting up taking off making road trips stuff so yeah, so yeah, that first night I stayed out in this is useless drove around the mountains for a while. I clipped it in a couple of different spots, but I found this one opened up the area. I don’t know if they’d quarried it back in the day. I’m sure they quarried out a significant section of that hillside back in the day, so a selection that forces show kind of opened up to a big sort of leveled off Pat and I set up the truck in the camp and stuff there.
I didn’t get a fire going. I should have. That’s the tricky thing about these January campouts as it’s like just deep in the winter like this it’s like there’s no daylight, so like you get up. I don’t know. I think it’s like daylight. I guess we’re at like 7:38 am. You can get up earlier than that and get your day gone, you know kind of I six or something there’s some good morning Twilight but in the evening gets dark fast, I think like around five o’clock but to 530 is when you get in the last of the sunlight and then in the Twilight real quick and then really it falls quickly this time of year. It is dark fast, like before six o’clock. It’s just pitch black, and it’s cold and winter, and it’s dark. You’ve got like 13 hours before the sun comes up, so you’re just sitting there going; a man well, I can’t be here by myself. It’s going to be a long time, so I see like the daylight or sign again, so it’s frustrating and there’s no right to do, but your thumbs are something that seems like when you’re out there, I think, and yeah, I could like to start a big fire and burn it for a while.
There’s also I don’t know it wasn’t set up for that for me for there, but it’s, but that is kind of what I want to do. I want a more traditional little camp spot with a campfire to keep me warm for a while. I did have that propane heater that I’ve been keeping with me that I know, like heater buddy or something. Whatever it’s called, but that one’s been pretty cool taking those like tiny portable propane tanks. It goes into its side and then adds a lot of heat to the back of the truck’s cab here. I think it will save for use in enclosed but ventilated areas, so it is pretty good. The car that came into the back of the truck works perfectly, pretty comfortable, stay pretty warm double bag did I still have the 15-degree bag.
Still, I take the other 15 degree bags I’ve got and stack them up and with each other, which helps a lot. It was great. I stayed pretty warm through the night. He was still, you know, around. I probably like 25 to 30 is as cold as a guy did freeze overnight, but it wasn’t much more like a frost and stuff for a while, so it was pretty good, but yeah, it was up in the mountains and stuff, you know just coastal mountain, so it’s only probably like 800 900 feet above sea level. But it was cool going up there to check out some spots. I was up there for two nights, which was cool. I liked going out there for two nights. I didn’t even make it as far as I thought it was going to get all the way down toward maybe Bandon or co keel this Mary’s out there that I’d like to go to, But the US downs toward Reedsport and then out into, I thought the Elliott State Forest down there and got to check out some more stuff. Did some 22 shooting get to drive around for a while got to check out some views get to do some photography? It was fun. I’m glad I got to check out some of that stuff. The second morning was cool. When I got up out there I took I got up in the truck, and I’m probably like 4 am kind of like what I was talking about earlier is you know that you’re just kind of like sitting there for a long time thinking like the man was 13 hours till it’s daylight. So I went to bed early. And I was able to like to wake up at 3 am 4 am. I’ve got kind of an off sleep schedule right now anyway. Then I was up there thinking well you know, like, I’m just In the car, and it’s cold back here, you know, as fine as it is, but I’m thinking, Well, yeah, I want to get ready to go in, I want to get out before sunrise, and I happen to wake up and stuff. So you guys, it’s as good a reason as any to do what I came out and said I was going to do, you know, come out and take pictures.
So I jumped in the cab of the truck, I got the heat gun, I got the car warmed up, I packed out the stuff outside in the back, and then got ready. And I drove out on these mountain roads. And I came up to this kind of open VISTA spot up on top of this hillside. And it’s cool looks out over a bunch of the coastal hills out there out to the east. And yeah, beautiful spot, beautiful morning and stuff, it was cool, you can see a couple of planets up above the horizon line, which is pretty nice. And then this, the sun kind of before it came up, you see kind of its glow under the horizon line out to the east. But yeah, really cool. And then down below, and the valley floors were just fogged everywhere. And so this is mountain terrain, I had this kind of creek channels that were all sort of narrow creek channels that was dropped under these, these mountain ridge kind of where I was at taking the pictures. And as you look down, there’s this, this elevation line where it’s just a fog. And it kind of fills it in like as if it was water, or you know, it’s like something like stagnant water that you could sort of fill in a lake without there and seeing what it was like, but it’s cool to be up above the fog light and then later drugged down into the fog. Nice, soupy, I think like right on the ground, it was like, pretty clear just seemed like a pretty heavily cloudy gray day. But I drove into a bit of town out there on the highway road, and I tried to get a coffee; all the little coffee stands that aren’t like chain coffee stands out there. And those, you know, super tiny towns and a bunch of other small businesses out there all still shut down because of COVID-19, all those restaurants and stuff like that. And you know, they’re just kind of like single operator owner-run stuff, I’d be shut down to like I am. And so I get it. But yeah, I was kind of thing I was driving, I was like I’m ever born into a coffee shop, there’s just some little mom-and-pop shop over here and whatever, you know, 800% down it is between, you know, out here on the Umpqua river or whatever it was, and yeah, close down close to the season or something.
And they’re just taking a break from it for the COVID-19 stuff to figure out settle down. And I understand that I’d do the same thing. I’ve seen that all over the state for the last year. So it makes a bunch of sense. But yeah, I was able to jump back up into the hills and stuff and then kind of pull up out of the fog line again and get back up on top of a ridge and find a couple of the Vistas to do some photographs from I was trying to work with the 14 millimeters or the 14 to the 14-millimeter lens. The 50-millimeter lens both came in to be helpful, and I was out taking some pictures; I’ve also been trying to incorporate some more stuff at like a bit of a higher compression, which I’ve been liking. But I’ve been doing many things with that, like heavy wide-angle, which I think is pretty cool.
I like the morning. The morning skyline stuff with the heavy wide-angle, it’s kind of cool. So I’ve been working on that a bunch through those on the computer after I got home. And we tried to edit through them and work on them a bit. I’ll try and throw them up on the website soon. I think I have a post coming up in a bit with some of that stuff. But probably I will be a bit, but I’ll get a bunch of that stuff up there. Now I’m also trying to figure out, yeah, this Easter Oregon trip, and I’ve got a couple of things planned out there. But the weather kind of keeps bouncing in and out and cooperating. So we’ll see how it is; I don’t know, I might not be able to do as long of a trip as I’d wanted to. That’s kind of what I was hoping to do is be out there for four days, three days, four days, or something like that. I’ll jump into that stuff more consistently as it kind of rolls into. I don’t know, March, April, but I’m just really not as good as taking the winter storms and stuff out here in Oregon, even if it’s, you know, still a pretty fair, mild climate temperature, you know, out here in the coastal areas.
I didn’t like what I see, you know, this weekend. We’re coming into a heavy storm, or you know, like a more significant winter storm that will come in and hit us for a bit. So this weekend. I don’t need to be camping, but maybe in a couple. We get a little fake spring sometime in February, and I’ll try to get out and do a couple of days of camping or something. I want to get into a lake. I got my fishing license and my hunting license too. But I want to get out and do some trout fishing at a lake. See if I can do it somewhere. So anyway, I hope you guys are doing good. Thanks a lot for checking out this episode of The Billy Newman photo podcast and listening to some stuff I’ve been up to doing some winter camping over on the coast. It’s been pretty good. I did it a little already. So it’s not a wrong kind of getting out and traveling around and stuff, and yeah, the first one, I did a lot of rain. Heavy rain. A lot of rain jacket time. I didn’t attract time this second time. Sunny, crisp weather. Clear skies at night. No wind. Oh, that was pretty cool. So yeah, kind of okay, two different types of it and stuff. So trying to get used to it through the wintertime but yeah, the cold weather stuff. It kind of bums me out a bit But try to forget some more stuff, but you can check out the website Billy Newman photo calm; it’s got some good stuff on it, a lot of new posts coming up, a lot of things on an Instagram page it also kind of mirrors that but black and white photos you guys can check out blog posts about those black and white photos are up on Billy Newman photo.com. And, yeah, budget conversions ever. There are incredible photos that you can check out. Get some good stuff. Thanks for checking out this episode. Appreciate you guys tuning in once again, and I’ll talk to you again next time.