Pacific Beach State Park, WA, Yurt Camping Trip: Day 3

Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip, Day 3

Yurt Camping, March 10, 11, 12, 13 in 2025

Yurt Camping in the Pacific Northwest
Tips, Information, Locations, Experiences
Oregon and Washington
Off Season Camping
By Michael P. Garofalo

During this camping trip, I visited all these small towns and villages (along a 30 mile stretch of Washington road 109) along the southwestern Washington coast: Ocean Shores, Oyehut, Ocean City, Copalis Beach, Friday-Griggs State Park, Iron Springs, Ocean Grove, Seabrook, Pacific Beach, Moclips, Qui-nai-elt Village, and the Quinault Indian Nation town of Taholah. 

Along Highway 101, I visited: Olympia, Aberdeen, Hoquaim, Lake Quinault, Queets River, and Kalaloch. I ate dinners at the nearby Seabrook restaurants, and meals in Olympia, Hoquaim, Ocean Shores, and the Lake Quinault Lodge.

Generally, comfortable weather from 40-505 F, little wind, and intermittent light to moderate rain. Lovely cloudy and misty skies. Full moon at night.

A few dogwoods in bloom amidst the leafless deciduous branches and evergreen firs, cedars, spruces, and pines.

Internet Photographs:

Birds at the Coast

This week, January 6-9, 2025, I yurt camped at Cape Disappointment State Park. The forested Park is near the towns of Ilwaco, Seaview, and Long Beach, Washington.

I saw many seagulls at the Seaview, 38th Street, beach access road shoreline.

The photographs below, not mine,  are available on the Internet:

25 Steps and Beyond Anthology
by Michael Peter Garofalo

Highway 101 and Hwy 1

Stepping Over Epiphanies

Haiku - North Sacramento Valley

A Fork in the Crypto Road

Exhibits at the Cyber Garden Gazebo: TextArt

At the Edges of the West

A Wreck Ahead Comes Into View

Cloud Hands Blog

Stuck in Some Concrete Poetry

Pulling Onions: 1,000 One Liners

Four Days at Grayland Beach

Meetings with Master Chang San Feng

25 Steps and Beyond Anthology

More Poetry by Mike Garofalo

Poetry Research

Five Senses

Fireplace Records Koan Collection

the scissors of my decisions

more to come ...

 

Forms are Full, Fullness begets Forms

Waves of Reflections at the Bandon Jetty

By Michael P. Garofalo
January 2023

The immense Oceans are undrinkable, and
in some ways unthinkable.  
No fresh water begets death, and 
Water is Life.

Words from the Heart Scripture went unsaid, and
the Bodhi Tree flourished in Life's Garden.  

Something evolves from Something Else, and
nothing evolves from nothing.

Beings emerge from Beings, and
emptiness disappears into emptiness.

"Nothing" is not a noun-thing, and
"Somethings" are dependent relationships.

Forms are Full, and
Fullness begets Forms.

Somethings created my body-mind, and
my body-mind created somethings.  

The Dao marries Yin-Yang, and
some of their step-children are Black Holes. 

Chaos is not emptiness, and
the Void provides Space for Somethings.

Somethings are transitory, ephemeral, and
They are Not empty illusions or unreal. 

Time is the crux of the matter, and
Somethings come and go, appear and disappear.  

"Nothing" is the absence of Something
we desire, and
not the presence of something.  

Somethings are Appearances, and
Appearances are Somethings.

Is or is not, true or false, real or unreal,
something or nothing, be Careful, and
sometimes choose the Middle Way of Maybe So.

Pointing to Nothing, and 
slogging through a muddy muddle of Mu.

Come Closer, Come Closer, and
Open the Door to Wonderous Beings.

Come Closer, Come Closer, and
Embrace Body-Mind-Spirit.
Cast off emptiness and the void.  

Gate Gate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha, and
some Lotus plants died in a drought.  Oh No!

Words from the Heart went unsaid, and
the Bodhi Tree flourished in Life's Garden.  (5) 

Waves of Reflections at the Bandon Jetty
By Michael P. Garofalo
January 2023

 The Heart Sutra and The Threefold Lotus Sutra.  

Emptiness and Forms

Experiences of "emptiness" are often a case of not finding something we desire in the complex world of Somethings.  Something desired seems or is missing.  We want a drink of water and the glass is empty.  We wanted wheat, and a drought destroyed the wheat crop and brought nothing we wanted.

Northwest Passage

 

Northwest Passage by Stan Rogers.  Performed by the Water Boys.

[Chorus]
Ah, for just one time
I would take the Northwest Passage
To find the hand of Franklin
Reaching for the Beaufort Sea
Tracing one warm line
Through a land so wild and savage
And make a Northwest Passage to the sea

[Verse 1]
Westward from the Davis Strait
'Tis there 'twas said to lie
The sea route to the Orient
For which so many died
Seeking gold and glory,
Leaving weathered, broken bones
And a long-forgotten lonely cairn of stones

Chorus

[Verse 2]
Three centuries thereafter
I take passage overland
In the footsteps of brave Kelso
Where his "sea of flowers" began
Watching cities rise before me
Then behind me sink again
This tardiest explorer
Driving hard across the plain
Chorus

[Verse 4]
How then am I so different
From the first men through this way?
Like them, I left a settled life
I threw it all away
To seek a Northwest Passage
At the call of many men
To find there but the road back home again

[Chorus]
Ah, for just one time
I would take the Northwest Passage
To find the hand of Franklin
Reaching for the Beaufort Sea
Tracing one warm line
Through a land so wild and savage
And make a Northwest Passage to the sea

Pacific Beach State Park, WA, Yurt Camping Trip: Day 4

Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip, Day 4

Yurt Camping, March 10, 11, 12, 13 in 2025

Yurt Camping in the Pacific Northwest
Tips, Information, Locations, Experiences
Oregon and Washington
Off Season Camping
By Michael P. Garofalo

Drive home from Pacific Beach to Vancouver.

Stopped a the Black Lake Boulevard shopping complex and Capitol Mall. This is a few miles west of Olympia. I browsed the very large Barnes and Noble Bookstore, and the nearby Half-Price Books. Excellent meal at a Japanese restaurant next to the bookstores. Purchased $100 in books and magazines. 

Interstate 5 South to Vancouver was relatively uncrowded today. 

Saw four accidents this trip: overturned truck that lost all its load, overturned car, a serious fender bender, and a  dramatic house fire incident in Hoquiam with many fire trucks.

Home before 3 pm. Unpacked!

Pacific Beach State Park, WA, Yurt Camping Trip: Day 2

Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip, Day 3

Yurt Camping, March 10, 11, 12, 13 in 2025

Yurt Camping in the Pacific Northwest
Tips, Information, Locations, Experiences
Oregon and Washington
Off Season Camping
By Michael P. Garofalo

During this camping trip, I visited all these small towns and villages (along a 30 mile stretch of Washington road 109) along the southwestern Washington coast: Ocean Shores, Oyehut, Ocean City, Copalis Beach, Friday-Griggs State Park, Iron Springs, Ocean Grove, Seabrook, Pacific Beach, Moclips, Qui-nai-elt Village, and the Quinault Indian Nation town of Taholah. 

Along Highway 101, I visited: Olympia, Aberdeen, Hoquaim, Lake Quinault, Queets River, and Kalaloch. I ate dinners at the nearby Seabrook restaurants, and meals in Olympia, Hoquaim, Ocean Shores, and the Lake Quinault Lodge.

Generally, comfortable weather from 40-505 F, little wind, and intermittent light to moderate rain. Lovely cloudy and misty skies. Full moon at night.

A few dogwoods in bloom amidst the leafless deciduous branches and evergreen firs, cedars, spruces, and pines.

Pacific Beach State Park, WA, Yurt Camping Trip: Day 1

 Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip, Day 1

Yurt Camping, March 10, 11, 12, 13 in 2025

Yurt Camping in the Pacific Northwest
Tips, Information, Locations, Experiences
Oregon and Washington
Off Season Camping
By Michael P. Garofalo

Drive from Vancouver to Longview, Centralia,
Olympia, Aberdeen, Pacific Beach.

In Olympia, I plan to shop at the Browser's Bookshop, Half-Price Bookstore, and eat lunch at the Olympia Oyster House, and drive around the Capitol Building and Budd Inlet parks.

I purchased and studied a new book of poems by Elizabeth Bishop during the four days of this yurt camping trip to Pacific Beach State Park in Grays Harbor County, Southwestern Washington.

Poems. By Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979). Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 2011, 352 pages. Paperback, VSCL. 

Living simply on the inheritance from her father, she travelled and lived in many countries. She wrote and translated in English and Spanish.

I read her poems during this Copolis River-Beach camping trip. Indoors out of the steady rain day and night, and indoors through the long outdoor winter darkness of the night.

My favorite poems by Ms. Bishop:
Objects and Apparitions 1976
artifacts in shoeboxes of memories
One Art 1976
“The art of losing isn’t hard to master.”

Explore Taholah, Pacific Beach, Seabrook,
Moclips, Quinault River, Lake Quinault,
Kalaloch Beach, Ruby Beach

I will post comments to this blog depending upon the availability of Internet service. Probably, after I return on March 13th.

Internet Photographs:

Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip

Pacific Beach State Park, Washington, Yurt Camping Trip

Yurt Camping, March 10, 11, 12, 13 in 2025

Yurt Camping in the Pacific Northwest
Tips, Information, Locations, Experiences
Oregon and Washington
Off Season Camping
By Michael P. Garofalo

Drive from Vancouver to Longview, Centralia,
Olympia, Aberdeen, Pacific Beach.

Explore Taholah, Pacific Beach, Seabrook,
Moclips, Quinault River, Lake Quinault,
Kalaloch Beach, Ruby Beach

Internet Photographs:

Oregon Coast Photos

 

Four Days in Grayland: Travels and Camping in Coastal Oregon and Washington

At the Edges of the West: Travels on US 101 - A Long Poem