Ocean

You know how much fun a beach party can be, if you are among the lucky ones to have access to a beach outside your door. You know how inviting beach parties are, and how much fun can be had among the sand and the surf. What are you to do if you have no beach nearby, and the closest thing you have to a body of water, is the above ground pool in your back yard? Can you still have a Beach Party of your own in your own back yard environment? Sure you can! A little planning, and the right ambiance, and you are on your way to the best beach party ever!

If your children want a beach party before fall ushers summer out for good this year, you can buy inexpensive kiddy pools; fill some with water, and some with sand, pails, and scoops. Add a slip and slide, and a sprinkler, and you have a beach party, extraordinary!

To begin, you will want to send invitations to your children’s friends, let them know to bring a swim suit, and enlist the aid of some of the parents who are willing to help out. Have plenty of colorful beach balls and beach towels handy, and why not have one giant cooler full of icy cold lemonade or water, and throw away cups, so the kids can help themselves by simply pushing a button, when they are thirsty? Just be sure to have trash cans nearby, so they can throw them away when they are through.

A picnic laden with watermelon, seasonal fruit, hamburgers, hot dogs, and chips to feed the masses, and your backyard beach party is bound to elicit as many smiles as the rush of the waves, and the sound of the surf at any beach party, on any beach, anywhere!

Mrs. Party… Gail Leino is the internet’s leading authority on selecting the best possible party supplies, using proper etiquette and manners while also teaching organizational skills and fun facts. Free Party Games to help complete your event.

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It’s a place of incredible romantic possibilities, with unbelievably pristine beaches and rugged shorelines, and plenty of hidden spots perfecting for long walks hand-in-hand, finding yourselves all alone. With such gushiness-inducing qualities, it’s no surprise you’ll soon wind up reproducing.

Lucky you. Oregon’s coast is perfect for families as well. Those hidden spots put you and the little ones right in the middle of some of the best nature can show off. Then there are the myriad of kid-friendly lodgings, restaurants and towns which pull out the stops for the kidlets or bring out the kid in everyone.

Still, you don’t have to sacrifice the finer things when you bring the kids.

On Oregon’s north coast, the tiny town of Manzanita is endowed with a mysterious, woodsy vibe just above its vast expanse of crystalline beach. Here, the San Dune Inn provides a vast array of freebies like bikes, game equipment, popcorn and movies. Stay at this charming, unassuming place just blocks from the beach and you’ll find stuff for volleyball and other games suitable for the sand, as well as beach balls, bikes and simple sandcastle-making gear like buckets. They have an enormous selection of movies, and their choice of board games is a kick as well. It’s a kid’s dream come true.

It’s also very pet friendly. www.sandune-inn-manzanita.com. 888-368-5163.

Head northward, and you’ll encounter dozens of sandy and rocky beaches perfect for playtime. Drive about 12 miles and you’ll find the ritzy resort town of Cannon Beach. Near a famed Lewis & Clark landmark, Fultano’s Pizza sits and emits wonderful smells of Italian cuisine. With an outdoor patio here, you can still see some of the sights available at the end of Second Street, and enjoy exceptional - even gourmet quality - cuisine at a family pizza joint price.

Fultano’s delivers to local hotels, and they feature slices for lunch. They have a special thin crust recipe that’s especially tasty, crunchy and yet still tender in a way that manages to combine both those latter qualities seamlessly.

There are many of the standbys, as well as gourmet varieties like the Margherita (garlic and herb olive oil, three cheeses, red onion and more), a Greek-themed specialty, a Goat Cheese pizza, and specialties with Teriyaki Chicken, Linguica, BBQ Chicken and a variety of seafood selections. One item features a distinctive sausage with mashed grapes for the sauce, providing a subtle, sweet tang. The sausage is spicy and zippy, making a nice balance to the slight sweetness.

One must-try is their pasta (about $10). They have a homemade tomato sauce that is one stunning, mother-of-all sauces, and their meatballs are a serious delicacy. Still, even with its decent wine and microbrew selection, this is a place that welcomes the kiddies nicely. 200 N. Hemlock and Second Street. (503) 436-9717.

Drive north again, to Seaside, and you’ll find a beach town full of things to do for children - most notably Broadway Ave. with its almost dozen arcade businesses, ice cream vendors, kooky gift shops, bumper cars and other attractions. See www.seasideor.com for more.

One highlight is Seaside Helicopters, which whizzes you around above the town for about $25 per person. It’s thoroughly spectacular, as the helicopter takes you over the headland of Tillamook Head and Cannon Beach as well, allowing you unforgettable glimpses of the sea and these landmarks from this unusual vantage point. You even get to see “Goonies Rock” - where part of the cult film was made. Hwy 101, S. Seaside. www.seaside-helicopters.com. (503) 440-4123.

Down on the Central Oregon Coast - about 100 miles south - it’s a vast playground for kids and adults. Lincoln City is filled with miles of super clean beaches and tons of shops and restaurants.

Just south of Lincoln City, you’ll find another haven for families in a very unique resort called Bella Beach. Really, it’s a collection of rather upscale, gorgeous beach cottages that are vacation rentals or for sale. There are about 40 rentals available inside this pretty place, and more are still being built.

The philosophy of Bella Beach is to create a place with a “neighborly feel,” and indeed they’ve succeeded. Set in the midst of a Central Coast wooded area, there are the rustic architectural themes common to places like Manzanita or Cannon Beach, where garages are tucked away behind the buildings and front porches are the emphasis.

There’s a playground for the kiddies, and the homes vary from hideaway lodgings for two with oceanfront hot tubs, to larger accommodations for bigger groups. Bella Beach also offers up accommodations for groups as large as 60, if you happen to have a business retreat or reunion of some sort.

Then there’s that wondrous beach. Like many of the beaches in the area, the tide line is at a rather steep slope, so waves come in fast and hard, but dissipate quickly to shyly lap at your feet. 866-994-7026 or www.bellabeach.com.

For more on the Oregon Coast, including extensive virtual tours and Lewis & Clark Bicentennial information, see www.beachconnection.net

Andre’ Hagestedt is editor of Beach Connection, a tourism publication that covers the upper half of Oregon’s coast - some 180 miles.

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One minute I’m cruising around this really cool new website about the Oregon coast, and the next I’m cruising around Highway 101, taking in all the clean air, the beautiful sights, gobbling some wowing food and visiting a lot of funky secret spots I found online. It’s a wondrous trip that’s hard to forget.

It begins with this site Oregon Coast Beach Connection: rather new, but already huge and all-encompassing in its coverage of the upper half of the coast. I started by goofing around the virtual tours (not all of them are completed), which have on average 60 different stops along various areas of the coast. I found some interesting hidden beaches near Cannon Beach, down in Newport and near Manzanita.

The site has this awe-inspiring, sprawling news section, where I discovered some great restaurants and hotels. I used their weather page to check the forecast just before I left on this really sunny weekend in February - and just like one of their stories about “winter weather secrets” said it would be - it was exceptionally warm in February. See their news section at www.beachconnection/news.

So I head out for the coast, first gobbling up insane seafood on the scenic, pristine Tillamook Bay at Pacific Oyster. They have this cioppino to die for. It’s thick, hearty and so stocked full of a variety of fish it puts a hatchery to shame. The oysters are like tender little chunks of beef: extremely rich and flavorful, quite powerful for their miniscule size. The smoked salmon burger was wonderful as well, and the view of the bay was magnificent. 5150 Oyster Drive. (503) 377-2323.

That night, I stayed at the Old Wheeler Hotel: a wildly romantic hotel in the tiny town of Wheeler that was carved out of an old building once ready to fall apart. This was totally amazing to discover, as the place has an extremely manicured, old world charm, with hard wood floors, chandeliers, clawfoot bathtubs and views of the untouched and pure Nehalem Bay. It’s been nicknamed the “Westin-Benson of the Oregon Coast.” I’m addicted and will be back. Hwy 101 and Gregory. http://www.oldwheelerhotel.com. 877-4theview.

Practically next door, it’s pure pizza heaven at a fairly new eatery called Guido’s Ristorante. The staff here was constantly hilarious - a little like watching the cast of “Seinfeld” interacting. But it’s the grub that was the real star of the show, with a thick, even juicy crust beneath a forest-like covering of innovative ingredients. The main chef there (he called himself Guido, but I think that was part of the gags of the evening) said he’d help me decide on my pizza selection and just make something up for me.

I shyly asked about meatballs on my pie, and he not only said “yes” but eventually brought me a masterpiece with various kinds of cheeses, a delicious marinara sauce drizzled on the meatballs and some kind of garden of vegetables which I can’t even remember. This place also had an outstanding view of the bay. 675 Hwy 101, Wheeler. (503) 368-7778.

The next day, I wander up just north of Manzanita to check out one of the incredible hidden spots I’d found at www.beachconnection.net. A set of grandiose cliffs and a small mountain hovers over the sleepy little beach resort, and on its north face lie some wild, weird slopes. The website said it resembled Ireland in some spots, and scenes from “Planet of the Apes” in others. Somebody nailed it on the head. You walk down these steep, grassy areas to come across a strange seascape of jagged, freaky rock structures and boiling surf. It was absolutely remarkable.

I again follow the website to a place called Hug Point, near Cannon Beach. I’d been here before, actually, but never seen the array of veiled pleasures and interesting details tucked away in one rocky area or another. There’s a waterfall, a few sea caves (one has some intricate structure inside that’s fun to crawl), and this rather mysterious road going around the point. According to Beach Connection’s site, the state had dynamited this road out of the rock in the early part of the century so old horse ‘n’ buggies and Model T’s could make their way around during high tides.

The area is a geologist’s wonderland too - but that’s another story.

Next up, I wander Cannon Beach and wind up in this tiny little wonder called Fultano’s Pizza. I ordered the penne pasta with meat sauce - and meatballs, of course. These meatballs are exceptional, with a marvelously multi-layered taste to them, like the subtleties you find in fine wine. The meat sauce is partially responsible for this, also with a few layers of goodness all its own. This place is a truly gourmet discovery, yet not only is it totally kid friendly but thoroughly has a romance element as well.

I came back here for dinner too, having this seriously delectable pizza with a sauce made from mashed grapes. This was fabulous, and I must say I’ve never had anything like it. 200 N. Hemlock and Second Street. (503) 436-9717.

That night, I bed down at a real charmer of a motel called the San Dune Inn in Manzanita, where I’m joined by my lady friend and her dog. This place is super dog friendly.

They have a large selection of movies, as well as other unique things I’ve never seen at a motel, like bikes for use of guests, volleyball gear, beach balls and other beachy equipment. Wow. We had a blast biking down to the beach (only a few blocks) and laughing as we got stuck in the sand. That night, after drinks at Guido’s beautifully hip little retro bar (just a few miles away), we dragged the bikes out again - although I’m not sure if this what the owners had in mind for these. 428 Dorcas Lane. http://www.sandune-inn-manzanita.com. 888-368-5163.

In the morning, we scarf down a combo of leftovers from Guido’s and Fultano’s, and slowly make our way north towards home. We stop at a castle-looking bed & breakfast called Arch Cape House and take a look around, completely awe-struck. Antiques filled these rooms, and the place looks like something between a castle and a ski lodge. We make a vow to the owners to be back and stay here next time. East Ocean Rd. - S. of Cannon Beach. http://www.archcapehouse.com. 800-436-2848.

For more information on the Oregon coast, make sure you go to http://www.beachconnection.net. You’ll find virtual tours, weather, lodging, dining, and as they claim, loads of “beach secrets.”

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