Oregon trails:
Headland hikes offer stunning beauty

By WILLIAM SULLIVAN
For The Register-Guard

SOME OF THE newest and most dramatic hiking trails on the Oregon Coast explore a Port Orford headland that has been off-limits to the public for most of a century. 

An hour's drive south of Coos Bay, Port Orford remains one of the most scenic and neglected towns in Oregon. Although not quite at the end of the world, this is in fact the westernmost incorporated city in the 48 contiguous states. 

Here, tourism is still a word spoken with a wistful air. The town itself sputtered to an inauspicious start when a misguided explorer landed nine settlers on the beach here in 1854, mistakenly thinking this was near the Klamath River gold mines.

Once off-limits to the public, the Coast Guard preserve at Port Orford is now a park with ocean view trails. Photo: WILLIAM SULLIVAN

The local Tututni tribe was so unwelcoming that the group of settlers retreated to a beachfront island, now known as Battle Rock, and fired a cannon into an onrushing crowd of natives, killing 17 people. 

Port Orford doesn't seem like the sort of prize to warrant such tragic bloodshed. There are no natural harbors on the Oregon Coast. Port Orford has one of the state's least likely ports. 

Even today, the city's dock juts out into a bay of the open ocean. The surf is so rough that boats do not dare anchor overnight. 

Each afternoon, a harbor crane hoists Port Orford's entire fishing fleet, boat by boat, from the ocean for storage atop the dock for the night. 

The city's precarious harbor led to so many shipwrecks that the Coast Guard built a lifesaving station in 1934 on Port Orford Heads, an oceanside bluff above town. 

Even this station had troubles with its ship. The only way to refuel the 36-foot, self-righting lifeboat was for crewmen to carry five-gallon cans of gasoline down 504 wooden steps to the boat's dock in Nellie's Cove, a narrow, rocky chasm. 

The station closed in 1970, but local volunteers have opened a museum in the barracks and built a network of short trails through the headland's fabulously scenic meadows. 

Drive Highway 101 south of Coos Bay 52 miles to a state park sign at milepost 301 in Port Orford. 

Turn west on Ninth Street for 0.2 mile, and then curve left onto Arizona Street for 0.8 mile to a parking turnaround. Walk a gravel path 50 yards up to a quaint, shingled building. 
 

Map: WILLIAM SULLIVAN

This is the barracks museum, with historic photographs and Coast Guard memorabilia. 

Although it's closed for winter, it will reopen in April, 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Thursday through Monday. 

Behind the barracks, take a concrete path up across a picnic lawn a few feet and turn left onto a barkdust path marked "Cove Trail." This route has stunning views of the turbulent ocean cove where the station's boathouse once stood. 

After 0.4 mile, you'll reach a railed site of the former lookout tower, with a view across Port Orford's bay to the dark hump of Humbug Mountain. 

From the tower site, walk up a cement path 50 yards and go left at the fork on a barkdust path that romps across a wind-mown salal meadow. 

In summer, wildflowers here include yellow composites, purple heal-all, red paintbrush, blue lupine, white yarrow and fuzzy cats ears. 

Keep left for 0.4 mile to a viewpoint above rocky islands where harbor seals lounge. 

Note Cape Blanco and Garrison Lake to the north. Then turn around and keep left for 0.4 mile to your car.