Exploring the Wild OREGON COAST on an RV Adventure!

Exploring the Wild OREGON COAST on an RV Adventure!

Welcome to the rugged, the wild, the windy Oregon coast. On this road trip, I headed down the coast, starting in Atoria and finishing in Newport, stopping at some of the most iconic sites along the way and camping in this beast of an RV from Road Surfer. The road trip really got started when we crossed over from Washington to Oregon on the Atoria Bridge, which is the longest continual truss bridge in North America. Our first stop of the day was to Fort Stevens State Park, which is home to a stunning beach with a shipwreck dating back to 1906, as well as a historic fortress. The fortress was built towards the end of the Civil War to protect the coast from British invasion from Canada. But my favorite part of the park was the Coffenbury Lake where we had a magical picnic lunch shielded from the wind and a perfect place for a refreshing dip. Then it was onward to one of the most iconic stops along the entire Oregon coast. You might recognize this from the Goonies or perhaps even Kindergarten Cop, but this hay stack is a magical place filled with marine life. Welcome to Canon Beach. This is probably the most famous beach along the coast, at least the one that I had heard of more than any other. And that’s for the hay stack that’s out here. It’s just about low tide, so we can walk right up to it. There’s supposed to be tide pools. You can see starfish. Windy from walking on the really soft, beautiful sand. This is a stunning beach. This beach is enormous at low tide. It’s also very like misty around the hay stack, so it makes it look kind of mythical. It’s very cool. [Music] [Music] At low tide, you can see all of these tide pools filled with colorful starfish and muscles. There are puffins nesting on the top of the rock. And we saw bald eagles circling overhead trying to find some food to bring back to their nests. The beach itself is so beautiful and wide and is such a nice place to go for a morning walk. We left the fog behind in Canon Beach and headed south along the coast to Oswald West State Park. So many people had recommended the Peak Hike to me, so I knew that I had to check it out while I was nearby. It was seriously overgrown. And if I was going to do this again, I would have worn pants instead of shorts because my legs got so cut up. But it was so worth it once we got to the top. Just making our way through the foliage. There’s the trail somewhere. It’s thick. It’s really thick. Ah. It’s a little sharp. Oh god. Oh, there is a a tree branch. Okay. Only a little bit more. made it to the top. It took about an hour and a half. It was tough. And you scale a few of these rocks to get all the way to the very top, but wow, look at this view. It’s so still up here right now. No wind. Beautiful. Absolutely worth it. All of the overgrown trails and the scratches. Definitely worth it. After climbing back down the mountain, we headed to Nalum State Park to camp for the night. This campsite was without a doubt one of the best we stayed at during this entire trip. A few minutes walk from our spot was this magical beach where we sat and enjoyed the sunset. I booked this campsite yesterday and I had no idea that it was on the beach. I thought it was on the estuary, but this is We just walked here from our campsite. Look at this. This place is incredible. Look at these dunes. The sand is so soft. I can’t believe this is Oregon. This is amazing. For the last couple of days, Luke and I have been camping in this Road Surfer Family Freedom RV. It’s a class C RV. We’ve never camped in something this big before. I’m really excited to give you a tour. It’s been so fun. We’re just at a little campsite here on the coast of Oregon. The beach is just over those hills. So, let me show you the cab. It’s a Ford believe it’s like a Eser E350 body type. Don’t quote me on it, but it’s got a rear uh reverse camera, which has made driving this bus so much easier. Have plenty of space for water and sunscreen and all of the things that we have been using. It’s got Bluetooth for directions and music. Plenty of space. Huge bucket seats for both driver and passenger. And like huge wing mirrors for those of you that are like nervous about driving something this big. It’s actually been pretty straightforward like driving a U-Haul. If you’ve ever driven a U-Haul around the country before, up here you have the alternative bed. There’s also seat belts here that you can strap in. So depending on how many people you want to have in the car. There’s also a television which is a smart TV. So if you want to connect to your favorite shows, you still can, especially when you’re uh tethered to electricity. You’re not using uh any of the battery. And then you have this huge living space. We haven’t converted this into a bed because we haven’t needed to, but this is also a full bed. Four people can sit here. comfortably. We’ve been storing our water down there. Here you have tons of storage, which includes the kitchen set. Is almost a fulls size kitchen. I mean, you have two gas hobs. You have tons of storage down here. You have a sink that when you’re connected to the water, you have plenty of water. You have a microwave that only works when you’re plugged into electricity. It doesn’t work um on any of your battery. So, that’s something to keep in mind if you do plan to use that. More storage up here. They all have this magnet so that they don’t come open while you’re driving. And then a huge fridge. I mean, enormous fridge full of everything we need for the week. And a freezer, which is crazy to have in an RV. And then this little notch so you can lock it and it doesn’t come open. Again, tons of storage up here. We’ve been able to fully unpack. So, this is the bedroom area. I’ll show you what the bed looks like. It’s actually a proper mattress. You can see here. So, it’s incredibly comfortable and it’s big enough for both Luke and I to sleep on. We move all the bedding during the day so that we can see out of the back window when we’re driving. But, it’s a really spacious setup here. Get up on the bed to show you how much space it is with a little perspective. So I can sleep right here and then plenty of room for Luke still. We’re a little closer together than we are like at home in our, you know, queen-sized bed, but it’s a double and it’s really comfortable. I am surprised. Last but not least, you have a fullsized bathroom. It’s huge. You have a flushable toilet that goes down to a black water tank. You have a full vanity sink with hot and cold water. You have a vanity mirror. These magnets are difficult. This liquid you put in your toilet to keep it from smelling. A full mirror to prepare yourself for the day. And then a huge shower. I haven’t tested it out yet, but we will have to test it out at a campsite we’re headed to tomorrow because they don’t have showers or toilets of their own. The curtain closes like this so you can get a full idea of how big the shower really is. I’m only about five feet tall and it is I mean I can touch the roof so it’s not ideal for people who are super tall but I think under 6 feet you’ll still be you’ll still be fine to cuz you can take this off the wall as well and sort of wash yourself that way but it’s not it’s not for giants. Nothing in a van is honestly. So yeah, I’ve definitely been spoiled now. I don’t think I can camp any other way. This was awesome. This was luxurious to be able to have everything with us in this huge van and to be able to have a bathroom whenever we needed it. A shower, a huge fridge, plenty of so much storage space. I feel like a week just got me warmed up and now I could easily spend another week or two really enjoying and embracing this sort of like lifestyle. I had so much fun. If you want to rent one for yourself, use code Bronner 11 to get 11% off your rentals. Prices for the RVs start at $99 per day in the US. I’ll put the link to Road Surfer’s website in the description below. The next morning, we hit the road to continue south and drive along the three Cape Loop Scenic Road. The first Cape along the route is Cape Mirs, home to this cute little lighthouse, the shortest one in Oregon at only 38 ft tall. It’s open for daily tours and was fun to learn more about its history. There’s also an octopus tree with unique branches reaching up kind of like octopus arms. The second Cape is Cape Lookout, which has a hiking trail that takes you all the way to the tip of the Cape. We made it. So worth it. It was pretty muddy out there, but still sneakers were just fine. And uh Oh my gosh, so beautiful. What an incredible view. Even along the way on both sides, you get different views of different like parts of the water and the peninsula and the spit that’s out there. Great day. Time to go to our camp and have a beer. The next morning, we woke up bright and early to explore the third and final Cape along the three Cape Loop Road, which was Cape Kanda. On the edge of Pacific City, Cape Kanda is home to a sand dune that is a whopping 240 ft tall, and you can climb to the top and slide back down if you so choose. It’s also a cool place to watch the Dory boats, these fishing boats that slide onto shore in the morning with a boat full of the day’s catch. [Music] The next stop was to a town that I was very excited to visit, Depot Bay, home to the smallest natural harbor in the world, and to a whale center where you can try to spot whales from the shore. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any whales, but we did see this very cute town and some stunning views of the rugged Oregon coastline. Further down the road, we turned off Highway 101 onto Otter Crest Loop Road, which took us to this amazing viewpoint, where we stopped to cook up some lunch. One of my favorite things about having the RV is that we always have our kitchen and dining room with us, so we can have lunch in the most magical spots. And it was here at Otterrest Viewpoint with only a few other people around that we spotted whales. what looked like a mama and her baby blowing puffs of air into the sky and arching through the water playing. After that, we visited the very busy Devil’s Punch Bowl, which was really cool, but not quite as cool as seeing whales. We hung out at the beach near the Punch Bowl for a while, watching the surfers catch waves in the icy, cold Pacific Ocean. The Devil’s Punch Bowl is very cool, but while you’re here, be sure to come to this beach. It’s so beautiful. It’s really sheltered from the wind. There’s a lot of surfers here today. But to see the ocean like come up against these pine forests is so beautiful. I I’ve never seen anything like this before. Every surfer has a full thick wet suit on. I just looked up the water temperature. It’s 51° F today. You got to really want to surf. Our final stop of the day was to Yakina Head Lighthouse. This outstanding natural area is home to a 93 ft lighthouse that has been operating since 1873. It also has a small beach where you can come down and see so much wildlife. We saw tons of seals and different birds, including this one black oyster catcher, which made its nest on the beach. So, they closed half of the beach to protect her. I can’t believe our road trip along the Oregon coast is over. It was even I mean 10 times a hundred times better than I even imagined it could be. It is so magical there. We got probably not as far as we thought we might get, but with it being such a busy weekend and with there being so much to see in sort of north and central areas of the coast, we packed in as much as we could without rushing, without trying to see too much in a day. It was the right pace. And if we had had maybe three or four more days, we could have gone a little bit further. But we had about 6 days to get along the coast and then an extra day to get back to Seattle. It was honestly unbelievable. I wouldn’t change a thing. It was so beautiful. The weather was perfection. It’s definitely chillier there. We’ve come in land already. It’s significantly warmer. We’re definitely getting a little bit more color on our faces being back in land. I’m so glad that I got the chance to do it like this in a camper van. Camping along the coast was awesome. Being able to be out in nature as much as possible, except for when we slept, was exactly how it should be done, I think, because there is so much natural beauty to see there. So, I highly recommend doing it that way if you can. If you have any questions about the coast or any other suggestions for things to see around the Pacific Northwest, as always, please let me know in the comments below. Thank you as always for watching and I will see you next time. We’re about to empty our gray water for the first time. Gray water is like the water that comes from the sink and the shower like down into the pot. Little setup here. You just dump it right in. So, I think you need to pull forward more. Oh. Oh. Should that be coming out already? No, you got to hook it up first, I think. But it’s coming out. Should they be out or in? We don’t know. Yep. Get ready. Now we’re pull left is gray. All right. Or is that black? There’s nothing coming out. Okay, let’s try this one. Ah, there we go.

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See the best of the Oregon Coast while I road trip in a Class C RV for the first time! In this video, I take you to must-visit spots like Cannon Beach, Oswald West State Park, and Cape Meares — plus, I share my experience living in an RV, give a full tour, and end with some hilarious rookie mistakes.

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