2 min
Overview
This short loop trail takes you along a forested coastal creek next to the Beverly Beach State Park campground. In the spring, the woodland wildflowers include miner's lettuce, woods violet, false bugbane, monkey flower, oxalis, and false lily-of-the-valley. It's a pleasant evening stroll if you are camped there, or it can be done as a wooded adjunct to the Beverly Beach-Moolack Beach Hike. Alternatively, consider it as part of a visit to other short trails in the area, including the Devil's Punchbowl Hike and Yaquina Head Hike. From the day-use parking area, head over Spencer Creek to a junction. Make a right to a footbridge over tannin-stained Spencer Creek. There’s a view of Beverly Beach from under the new Spencer Creek Bridge on Highway 101 from here, with Otter Rock protruding beyond the surf. On the other side of the footbridge, a fenced enclosure contains a 4,100 year-old spruce stump exposed by erosion. The path heads right through Loop B of the campground. Keep straight across the access road to the campground and the check-in station. Pass the spring/summer Spencer Creek Welcome Center on the right. The Spencer Creek Nature Trail leads off to the right just past Campsite C3. There’s a footbridge over the creek and you enter a coastal woodland of Sitka spruce, elderberry, and sword fern. A spur leads right into a field and walk-in camping area. The trail continues slightly upward into a spruce/hemlock grove and then drops into a skunk-cabbage bottom. The slow-moving creek, rimmed by red alders, runs silently to the left. The muddy trail continues on the level. There are few footprints but there may be many bike tracks leading here from the campground (even though bicycles are not permitted on the trail). Cross a small tributary among skunk-cabbages. The trail winds through another spruce/hemlock grove and veers left to cross a footbridge over the creek. On the north side of the creek, the trail hugs the creek bank. Campsites are to the right. Hike under spruces and alders and, in the wet season, so
Trail Stats
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9 m
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Photos
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