Day 7 Brookings to Gold Beach, Oregon (66 miles)
Today we get up at 6 and dress in warm layers. We have a quick breakfast and are on the road by 7:30. We are headed to Gold Beach to spend the day on an all day jet boat tour on the Rogue River. It is quite foggy and cold this morning. We are on our way when we come upon the tour leader Gil at the side of the road and he has lost the fan on his car. We end up towing him to the top of the grade. They end up breaking the other blade off his fan and he drives it onto Gold Beach, in time for us to get on the boat.
The sun is trying to break through the fog. There are a lot of fishermen on the river.
We start seeing birds: egrets, osprey, bald eagles, turkey vultures, and bald eagles. We also see the nests of osprey and eagles. We also see some otter.
We come up on a Fish & Game team who are trying to net fish on a certain area of the river to see what type and how many fish are there. They ended up netting zero fish!
We continue on up the river through the scenic section into the wild river section with rapids and deep canyons. We go for 52 miles up with great scenery, spray from the jet boat, and the guide giving us facts about the area along the way. This time of year the water is getting very low in certain parts.
A fun day was had by all. On the way back the boat makes a stop at Cougar Lane Lodge for a great lunch. By now it is hot and we have peeled layers of clothing off and the pilot cools us down further with a nice spray of water! Mom enjoys it.
We enjoy the drive back to Brookings along the beautiful Oregon coast.
We meet up with John and Dawn and have another great sea food dinner before hitting the sack.