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And get ready to embark on a new adventure with us around the globe.

Hey squatties, welcome to this week’s Just the Tip.

Today you have me, Kim, to share a quick trip to the coastal Pacific Northwest town of Yahats, Oregon.

Yahats is pronounced as I said it, but it is spelled YACHATS, so don’t be confused with that when you see it.

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If you’re going to look it up, which I guarantee you will after you hear this episode, Yahats is a charming coastal village on Oregon Central Coast.

It’s where this rugged volcanic shoreline meets lush coastal forest.

Really seeing those two juxtaposed against each other is a gorgeous sight to see.

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It is often called the gem of the Oregon Coast, and now I know why.

And when you go, you will understand it too.

It has this dramatic scenery, but it has a very laid back atmosphere.

It’s pretty easy to access from some of the main parts of Oregon, and it’s worth the drive over the coastal Ridge into this beautiful town.

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Unlike many of Oregon’s beach towns, Yahats really is defined by its rocky, basalt coastline.

It’s rather wide, beautiful sandy beaches.

Visitors come here because they want to see these powerful waves crash against these sea cliffs.

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They want to explore the rocks and the colorful tide pools and just take a beat and enjoy themselves.

It is a very, very relaxed vibe.

In fact, that’s most of what I did when I went here.

You come here to take in the views, go for a stroll, take it a little slower, hike around.

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There’s lots of trees and the coastal Ridge is right there.

So plenty of opportunity for hiking with these beautiful coastal views and forests.

When I went to Yahats I drove from Salem into Yahats so it was about two hours leaving Yahatsu went down the coast to Eugene so about two hours that way as well.

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Pretty easy and if I could do the drive Squatty’s you can do it too.

There were some twisty roads.

I got a little crazy there for a minute, but if I could handle it, I am confident that you can too.

This was a little side quest on my Willamette Valley wine trip.

I really, really wanted to see the coast of Oregon while I was in town and this did not disappoint.

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It was worth the trek over there.

I miss the coast so much from living in San Diego, so anytime I go to a place that has a coast or I can make that happen, I really try to do that, and I did.

With only two hours each way, it’s definitely worth the trek.

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There are no dramatic clip drop offs.

It’s a rather manageable drive, but it’s really cool as you do drive in, say you’re coming from Salem, where you’re coming from Eugene, where it can be warmer in the summer.

As soon as you do get over that coastal Ridge, you drop into these cooler temperatures.

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It gets a little more foggy, a little more Gray in the skies.

The pace is noticeably calmer and it’s really, really cool to just go 2 hours up the road and be in this almost what felt like a completely different universe.

So I took this drive and as I made it to the coastline, that’s not actually yahats.

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You still have to go South Down the coastline to get there.

So I wanted to make a few little stops along the way.

Some places that I researched that looked cool to check out.

One of those was Newport.

About 10 miles South of the main town of Newport, there’s a place called Sealed Rock Beach.

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Seal Rock Beach is a pretty cool stop if you can manage it.

I would highly recommend it.

One of the reasons I wanted to stop here was because it reminded me of Cannon Beach.

I really wanted to go to Cannon Beach, which is about an hour from Portland, but because of my route it just wasn’t going to be feasible.

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So Seal Rock Beach was the next best thing.

And it’s really cool.

They have these huge rocks out in the ocean similar to Cannon Beach.

It’s got a beautiful big beach, great for a stop to walk on the beach.

It’s Sandy, it’s got the organ vibes, it’s really, really pretty and you could spend an hour here, you could spend 3 hours here.

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You could do a quick trip and do 20 minutes here, but it’s worth a stop to break up your trip.

After that, I continued down.

I was going to be staying at Fireside Motel.

I said motel, right, which typically I wouldn’t be gravitated towards a motel, but Yahats is a small town, so you’re not going to find a lot of these big ritzy resorts.

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They do have a couple of resorts, but don’t let the words motel for Fireside Motel sway you from this place.

It is actually amazing.

I had an oceanfront king room.

It had a dining table, a couch, a living space, A fireplace, and a private balcony.

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It didn’t have robes.

It is a motel after all.

I should have brought my own because it would have been perfect for the vibes here.

But the beautiful window in the hotel room, you could see the ocean, the waves, hear them crashing the entire time.

And I thought, OK, I’m going in July.

I might not need the fireplace.

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But because the Oregon coast is actually a lot cooler than where I had been in Oregon, I did use the fireplace.

It’s a gas fireplace.

You don’t need firewood.

You flip the switch, it comes on.

The vibes were Immaculate.

I popped a bottle of wine.

I sat by the fireplace with the balcony door open and I just was in my vibe.

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I actually did this as a little solo track, so I was just Zen.

Like it would have been the perfect place to just do a little journaling, do a little self reflection.

I actually felt like with the weather and the look and being there so low, I feel like I’m in one of those movies about a woman that goes to Nantucket after her husband dies to rebuild her life and falls in love with her childhood.

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It was that kind of vibe.

So if you’re looking for that, I highly recommend it.

I just really, really enjoyed looking at the ocean for a straight 24 hours.

I only sent one night here.

Right outside of the Fireside Motel is the coast.

Oi could exit my building.

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I was right there in the grass, walk into the rocks and there’s a beautiful pathway.

So there’s a gorgeous pathway.

You walk along, take strolls, look at the tide poles, go out into the rocks, see the waves crashing a little bit closer and there’s a lot of families out there.

It’s very chill vibes.

People are walking their dogs.

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Fireside Motel is also a pet friendly hotel.

If you bring your pet, there’s just a fee and you can bring Fido.

So I did that.

I took a little walk, enjoyed myself.

I, I went down to the convenience store, which is where you check in for the Fireside Motel.

I got a few snacks.

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They even have DVDs that you can rent for the fam if you want to just sit by the fire and watch a little movie.

I didn’t do that, but I did get some snacks and I did go back up to my porch, put the blanket around me, had my glass of wine and I just sat and watched the ocean for a long time and it was amazing.

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Flipped on that gas fireplace, but it was getting a little bit later and I wanted to get dinner.

So there was a place not too far down the road, another resort, where they had the only oceanfront dining in yahats.

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So I went down there.

I had myself a nice steak dinner with potatoes and vegetables and a glass of wine.

It was amazing, right in front of the ocean.

Beautiful.

And then I took the five minute walk back up the trail to my hotel room where I enjoyed more relaxing by the fireplace.

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Actually, I accidentally left the fireplace on and I woke up in the middle of night, like drenched in sweat.

So the fireplace does work, even though it is a gas fireplace.

By the way, if you’re interested in that resort, it’s called the Adobe Resort.

I do recommend it for dinner.

It’s also a great place to stay if the Fireside Motel is not available.

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The next morning I rose to the sunrise.

You don’t see the sunrise over the West Coast, but you can kind of see the sun rising.

I woke up to it.

I left my door cracked open to my balcony so I could hear the waves all night, which was really cool.

They have a great coffee maker in the room, so I made myself a nice mug of coffee wrapped up in a blanket.

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My PJ’s sat out on the chairs on my balcony and I just slowly enjoy my coffee, watching the waves and watching the world wake up.

And slowly more people started walking their dogs and walking with their families.

It was really cool.

Around 11, AMI checked out, returned the key and then I was making my way back into Eugene and down into Medford to go visit a friend.

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So that’s about a 2 hour drive, but I knew there were a few stops I wanted to make along the way.

If you’re staying in yahats longer, there is a little town that has a few good restaurants like the Drift Inn I saw that they had where you could kind of like mine for gemstones, which is kind of cute.

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So that would be a fun little excursion if you’re staying, say two nights, which I would love to come back and do.

But there were a few natural attractions that I wanted to see before I left this coastal area.

Squaddies, I’m going to recommend that you make sure you download offline maps in Google because this part of the drive, you will lose service once you exit the Yahats town.

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You’re basically going to lose cell phone service.

You can’t really get lost because it’s kind of a straight shot.

You will regain service once you make it to Florence.

So you can just go off human instincts or you can download offline maps.

Like we always say, first stop, not too far past the town is Devil’s Turn.

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There’s parking lots for all of these natural attractions.

So I found myself a nice parking spot.

Got out, did a little hike.

It was maybe a half mile or so, a little winding trail through the forest with coastal views to Devil’s Turn.

And that is where in the rocks, the water flows in.

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It churns up exactly as it sounds.

Kind of a quick little stop to check it out.

But the walk itself, the journey kind of is the destination.

It’s very beautiful to amongst forests with an ocean view.

Next stop down the road is Thor’s Well.

Here the parking lot was full.

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I had to wait a long time before a spot opened up.

And was it worth it?

Yeah, I definitely say it was.

There’s Thor’s Well is essentially a big hole in the rocks where the water is cascading in like a waterfall all around.

It’s pretty cool to see.

Cool little stop.

I mean, it’s not a place you’re going to spend your whole day.

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The next spot is called Spouting Horn, not too far from Thor’s well.

Also, this is the opposite where the water is coming in and flushing up.

So you see a big sprout of water come up from the rocks from the distance.

I will say by this time it was probably around noonish that I was getting here and the parking lots were getting really full.

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So if you want to see it without the crowds and the parking situation come early, maybe 8:00 AM or so, that would be better.

Or plan to just park and hike for a while.

There’s fees to park in these lots.

If you’re just doing a little quick stop, probably it’s OK if you don’t pay, but if you’re going to actually stop in day use, then pay the fee to park.

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And there’s trails that connect all of these attractions, so you can really have a day of just hiking through the forest, through the coast.

It would actually be a very, very beautiful day.

But I needed to kept going.

I had a winery reservation that I was making time for and I was making perfect time.

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I will say to you, once you get past your huts, there’s not really anywhere to stop for like gas or snacks or anything.

And you’ll lose that phone service.

So just keep that in mind if you were needing something like that.

So I kept heading down the coast and the drive is actually really pretty.

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It does get pretty windy and it’s not like a coastal drop off of the Cliff.

That would be really scary.

But there were some roads that made me feel very brave.

But it’s really pretty, I mean, to have on one side of you the huge Cliff with forest towering over you, and then on the other side you have forest.

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But then you’ll see the coast start peeking out.

It’s a gorgeous drive.

So if you’re not the one driving, you can really, really enjoy it.

But even if you are driving, it’s pretty nice to see.

And that goes on for quite a while.

You see this eerie fog, these thick forested mountainsides, ghosts poking through.

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There’s a lot more places to stop off the state recreation areas.

I didn’t stop in any of them because I wasn’t going to be staying for the day and recreating, but you definitely could.

The only other place that I stopped was Hesita Beach and Lighthouse.

Really big, beautiful lighthouse.

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Big Sandy beach below.

You can have a really nice walk on the beach there.

Lots of cars in this parking lot again, so if you again want to miss the crowds, start earlier.

I continued on to Florence.

Florence is the next major city where they have the big box stores in the fast food chains that you might expect.

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Great place to stop for a bathroom break.

And then this is where I turned E on that freeway road to head back into Eugene.

Wonderful, wonderful little side quest.

I would highly recommend going Squatties and I would love to go again.

I want to spend at least two nights there when I go so I can hike more and explore the little town of your huts.

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Squaddies, thank you so much for tuning into this week’s Just a Tip.