The beautiful, dramatic scenery on the 804 Trail in Yachats.

At the mouth of the Yachats river.

We found this poor fella wriggling in the sand between rocks. I looked it up later and found out it’s a Pacific Lamprey Eel (not really an eel though). It’s spawning season now and the ocean living adults head upstream into fresh water to lay eggs, similar to salmon. The adult lamprey feed on the blood of fish, sharks and whales, attaching with a sucker like mouth filled with nasty looking ‘teeth’. They in turn are food for salmon, seals, sea lions and possibly bald eagles! Somebody got ahold of this guy, but didn’t finish him off! We left him (it) in peace.

We found this cute carving in a tree trunk on our walk around the residential cottage development we are staying at. We left it for others to discover!