RangerNehalem Bay State Park Campground
Great vibe!
This was our next to last stop on the way home from Beverly Beach. Two campgrounds about the same size, could not be more different! The spaces at Nehalem Bay are still close, but not as close as Beverly Beach. There were kids, but just not as many running about. The vibe was so laid back here. We lucked out with a semi-private site. We had the site that was next to the road going to the horse camp area so there were some trees on that side and behind us, though you could still see a little bit of one or two horse sites. And I could hear the horses every once in awhile, which I found very comforting. The ocean is just over the dune and there are a couple different trails to get over to it. The beach itself is lovely with soft sand and very little seaweed or anything that comes in with the tide, the only issue is that it is windy. It's not too bad at night, but during the day, it is rough. We tried to take our kiddo out to play in the sand and it just sucked. Good spot for wind surfing or paragliding though as we saw several people doing this down the beach a little ways. One thing we would have liked to do, but could not convince our kiddo, there is a 2 mile loop trail around the airstrip (oh yeah, there's an airstrip here too on the bay side of the park where people can fly in and camp) and trails down on the jetty from the day use area. There is also a horseback riding outfit down there that operates seasonally. There is a playground, but it's not a traditional type of playground with swings and slides, at least not in our group of loops. It wasn't the best for little kiddos. We did not explore loops A,B, and C so not sure if that playground was the same. Lastly, the dump station: there are two lanes here, which is great. Nobody was at the dump station when we pulled in, so no waiting. This park is also partaking in the pilot program where you scan the qr code and pay $10 to dump tanks. I had Verizon connectivity at this park so there was no issue there, but someone a scribbled across the qr code at the dump station my husband pulled into so I had to go to the other lane to scan that qr code. Not a big deal, but it's just a different type issue. Once I scanned the qr code, it took me to the site and I didn't have any problems paying.
