Cannon Beach

We took a family trip this weekend to celebrate our 11th wedding anniversary. Man, has it really been that long? Anyway, we rented a cabin at our favorite Oregon beach, Cannon Beach, and enjoyed a nice getaway together as a family. We had three days of varying weather--you never know what you'll get at the Oregon Coast. The first day was gloriously beautiful and fairly warm so we spent a lot of time outside, playing on the beach and shopping in town. The kids tried to build a sand castle with a moat around it. We were playing in pretty dry sand and they didn't understand why the water kept disappearing every time they tried to fill the moat!

We also visited the site of the shipwrecked Peter Iredale (ran ashore in 1906). As you can see, the remains of the ship are nearly gone. It is fascinating to see!

We discovered Fort Stevens quite by accident. We didn't really know what Fort Stevens was and thought it was just a State Park for camping. Wow, were we wrong! It is a historical military site dating back to pre-Civil War days and was built up and used all the way through WWII. In the earlier years, the fort had cannons that were built on retracting stands so they would raise up above a wall, fire, and then lower back down behind the wall to remain hidden. Cool, huh?



Later the cannons were replaced with more modern guns that could fire up to 15 miles out! Did you know during WWII a Japanese submarine shelled the coastline at Fort Stevens? Under much controversy, we never fired back, even though we knew the coordinates of the sub and would have bombed it out of the water. Some say we never fired to preserve the secret location of the Fort--others say the commanding officer wimped out. Interesting stuff!



Anyway, we explored the whole area, which took us over a day. We climbed all over everything and even scared each other by hiding around dark corners. It was really fun and very informative. I will admit, being a native Oregonian, I felt a bit guilty not knowing this particular history of my state. Sometimes we travel far to "exotic" places to see the sites and yet we never learn about what is in our own backyard!


Sunday was Easter, and the Easter Bunny found us at the beach! Good thing--the kids were worried about that. We even had to call Grandma and make sure she left a note at the house to tell the Easter Bunny where we were! The weather had turned very wet by Sunday--good thing it was time to go home!