Our morning hike involved some amazing sand dunes. It was my first real taste of the sandpocalypse to come. As I type this, I’m pretty sure I have 3 cups of sand in my backpack. I have sand in every Ziploc baggie, in every article of clothing, and inside my ear.

But it was still fun and exciting at first. We enjoyed the morning hike with Blade and Unplugged, but halfway through came the parting of ways. Julie and I had a zero day booked for Florence; they had one in Bandon. Our little tramily was done. It was really sad.

But I felt really really lucky that we had the time with them that we did. As Julie and I started our walk into town, we realized that the place we had intended to camp was kind of terrible. Luckily we met a couple of locals out walking their dogs and they suggested a place we could legally tuck in for the night.

It was an absolutely beautiful place to camp. In the morning we woke up and started our walk to town when we ran into one of our locals again! Ed gave us a lift to the laundromat where we took $4 showers (EXCELLENT VALUE) and did laundry.

We got breakfast and made it to Lighthouse Inn. Charming place and people.

Florence was a lovely place to take a day off.

We had a chance to visit Homegrown Brewery, see some seals, walk around the Old Town, and enjoy the fireworks right from our front door.

So far I think Florence was my favorite town. It felt touristy without being too touristy. It felt like people actually live there and can perhaps even afford to live there… but that may just be ignorance on my part.