Haystack Day Two!

Day Two began with a drive back to Cannon Beach, past funky fish places….

And then through Rockaway Beach, where I found gnomes….

Moose….

and birds. Does anything beat beach hokiness?

I drove back over Neahkahnie Mountain—what a view!

Our class was to meet at 9:00 am at the foot of Haystack Rock. Walking through Cannon Beach, I passed a Christian Conference Center where 95% of the cars in the parking lot were mini-vans. Does anyone else but me find that humorous?

And there were more cute gardens….

And funny signs…. (Can you see my reflection in the shot?)

And even funnier cars!

It was low tide, and there was so much to see. It was a “fragile marine garden area”—we were only allowed into certain areas.

We saw mussels—some of which were 80 or more years old, and about the size of my forearm!

There were lots of anemones—these were about 4 inches across.

We also saw sea stars (a.k.a. “starfish”).

In the afternoon, we went to a different beach to look at rocks and lava fields. This is an example of a basalt intrusion (colored reddish form iron pigments) in a sandstone field. The sandstone is baked hard and black on either side of the basalt, from the high heat of the melted rock.

And here’s another basalt intrusion, under a sandstone cliff. This part of the beach was once under a few hundred feet of water. Of course, that was a few million years ago!

It was a wonderful time…. I definitely hope to return next year.