Travels with Murray: Coos Bay and Eugene

Coos Bay and Eugene, Oregon

May 23 - June 7, 2025

Lonely Beaches for miles

This chapter combines two places and includes two weeks of travel. On the 23rd we traveled back to the gorgeous Oregon coast on some narrow winding roads. We have now come 1,300 miles! Diesel costs us .69 cents per mile! Eeeeek!

Bird of the Week(s): Baby Duckies the dogs and I saw at Mingus Park.

Coos Bay

Coos Bay is a working coastal town with lots of fishing boats and fish processing facilities. We immediately bought some local smoked salmon at the outstanding Chucks Seafood Market and Oyster Farm that was out of this world. We loved it so much we had to buy more.

We arrived on the Memorial Holiday weekend and because as usual we had booked so late we had the lousiest spot in the park. Denis manage to upgrade us to a gorgeous spot right near the beach after the holiday folk left. Lots of long walks on lonely beaches. We still are amazed at the stark beaches with heavy wooded areas leading right down to the sand. Also saw deer prints on the beach which makes sense as the beach abuts the pines.

The dogs liked it too as they got to go commando (off leash) when no other dogs are about. There are also some tidepools we can explore on our walks. 34 zillion mussels and some big starfish. Our second space was magic as we had a big, solid fire pit so we perfected our fire making skills while we heard the roar of the waves.

Some funny signs at our Coos Bay Park:

Our Coos Bay Park had two amazing features: 1) a Crab Cooking Station 2) a Dog Wash Station! We took advantage of the latter as the dogs were smelling, let's say, "less than fresh."

Sue explored Mingus Park with the dogs one day and behold! Another Japanese Garden! It was fine... She did a couple of other local hikes but nothing spectacular.

Food/Restaurants

Still enjoying our Rogue Creamery Blue Cheese we made a wedge salad one night. Yum! The smoked salmon we used on bagels and then made a pasta dish with dill and pine nuts. We made sandwiches with our leftover ribeye -- arugula and grilled red peppers with mustard aioli on sourdough. This was a yum. Also Denis perfected grilled asparagus - olive oil, Montreal Steak Seasoning (gives it a smoky flavor) and lemon juice. Poor guy has to prepare it this way forever now. Inspired by leftover corn chips we made green Chiliqueles. About 5.5 outta 10. We are spoiled by Denis' homemade tomatillo sauce but we used canned.

Linguine with local smoked Salmon

Man the Salmon is good!

We always try to patronize local, independent restaurants so we tried Sharkbites, an odd location combining a restaurant with a like, surf shop. We should have paid attention to a two-word Trip Advisor review: "don't go." Part of our experience was our fault as we ordered fried oysters (supposedly local) which we never eat. They were giant, filled with yutz and greasy. We then explored the crab cakes which were meh. Denis: Would not usually order fried oysters and this place did not change my mind. They were soggy and gritty and too big. The chowder was tasteless and did not have enough clams. the crab cakes were ok. Disappointing... Sue detailed our experience in a Yelp review which normally she would not do but there were some unsafe food practices going on in addition to lousy food.

Museums and Points of Interest

We toured the Coquille (pronounced "Co-Quel" by the First Peoples) River Lighthouse on Saturday. It was pretty cool - unlike the Pt. Loma lighthouse in San Diego it did not include Light Keepers quarters. Sue: I thought of my friend Casey Hart when I saw horseback riders on the beach near the lighthouse. We then toured the Coos History Museum which reminded me of that old saying "Just because something is old doesn't meant it's interesting" - that is slightly reductionist but it was not overwhelming, let's leave it at that. Then we visited the University of Oregon Charleston Marine Life Center which was pretty cool and where we got to see a GPO (Great Pacific Octopus - like Marcellus if you've read Remarkably Bright Creatures which my sister Anne turned me onto).

U of O research vessel

The one part of the dunes you could take dogs

This part of Oregon is famous for its dunes so on Memorial Day, after watching the jaw dropping Memorial Day Parade at our RV Park, we drove up the coast a bit to Oregon Dunes State Park. They have a OHV area that had huge dunes but we went to a place we could walk the dogs. Smaller dunes but pretty interesting.

Eugene

We had a super cool spot in Eugene at Armitage County Park. Lots of space and the park was huge with a path that led directly to the McKenzie River. We had last-minute booked Saturday so we stayed in one spot on Saturday then moved on Sunday. As soon as we arrived we went to the Cascades Raptor Center which showcases many types of birds of prey, some of which were born in captivity, some of which were born in the wild and rescued for various reasons. Many of the birds are used for educational purposes. It was fantastic to be able to compare a Turkey Vulture to a Golden Eagle for example.

One of the highlights of Eugene is that we got to see Sophia and her boyfriend Forrest. Sophia is a PhD student at the U of O studying Psychology - specifically Cognitive Neuroscience. Saturday night they hosted us for dinner at their ridiculously cool house. It's so nice to see your kids adulting! The next day we went to the downtown farmers market which is huge. It's divided into 4 sections one of them is the hippie section. Drum Circle, tie dye, patchouli. The best description i heard from Sophie when i mentioned that this was Uncle Dougs kinda place was "Yeah, it's pretty DouggieCore". He would have fit right in here. Everyone had some little quirk that made them unique. It was a pretty refreshing change from rural Oregon!

Tie Dye Galore

People doing their own thang

The Willamette river bike path

We biked along the Willamette river path. Eugene is the most bicycle friendly place i think i have ever been to. There were bike paths literally everywhere and the river path is beautiful. We saw some Nutria playing in the water and they were pretty cute for giant rodents.

Sue flew back to San Diego on June 1 for a much needed dose of family and friends and to check on the house. Denis stayed with the dogs and spent some more time hanging with his daughter.

Love cookin with my daughter!

I took Sophie to Costco and stocked her up and bought a few items for myself. Costco doesn't usually work because we cannot store costco size portions but splitting items worked well. Bought some nice ribeyes and Sophie and Denis made Chimichurri and a spinach salad with strawberries. Very yum.

I think i would take up fly fishing if I lived here

Denis got his steps in with Sue gone and needing to walk the dogs more often. The park was huge and the walk along the river was a great way to break up the workday. Eugene just kinda had a heat wave and all the pollen was attacking. Denis' eyes were red the entire time. Visine helped but man, that was something.

McKenzie river!

Denis got to visit the University of Oregon campus and see Sophie's lab. It was a pretty cool space with a MRI and other cool gadgets. The campus is very green. Lots of trees and grass spaces with old style brick buildings. Very different from SDSU. Went to Prince Puckler's Ice cream cause someone said to. meh. Got nothing on Gelato Vero.

One more dinner with Sophie and Forrest for an early Birthday and Eugene was in the books. Off to Portland next for some big city hijinks.