There is a lighthouse on an offshore rock just 1.2 miles from my home in Cannon Beach, Oregon, that is enchanting. It’s rugged, mysterious, and full of life. The Tillamook Rock Lighthouse, also known as Terrible Tilly, was built in the 1880’s on a tiny chunk of basalt rock and operated until 1957. At the time, it was one of the most costly lighthouses built because it was dangerous for keepers, supplies, and builders to access. Each year, storms threaten the structure and have shattered the lens, damaged the building, and eroded the rock.
Each fall, shearwaters, phalaropes, and other seabirds move past the Oregon coast. We don’t always get a good view of them from land. However, the other morning on my usual look at Terrible Tilly, I noticed some whale spouts! August is typically the time we get good whale sightings, so I grabbed my spotting scope and set up on my perch overlooking the ocean. To my surprise, a huge mass of Sooty Shearwaters moved among the whales in a feeding frenzy! Moments later, while checking Facebook, I saw a notification that an upcoming boat trip around Terrible Tilly had an opening, so I booked it immediately. Two weeks away, we anxiously checked the ocean every day, hoping the shearwater frenzy would still be happening.
The morning came, and we boarded the Alaska Sunrise with an excited group of people, and off we went. Garibaldi Charters offers a variety of tours, including pelagic birding trips in partnership with Oregon Pelagic Tours, which we’ve been on before. This trip was more general and included the option for fishing and crabbing. So when we crossed the bar, instead of going straight out to sea, we headed north towards Cannon Beach.
It was a nice morning to be out on the water with little swell and a beautiful sunrise. Along the way, we were seeing Heermann’s Gulls, Rhinoceros Auklets, Common Murres, and lots of cormorants. After about 1 ½ hours of powering, we finally reached Silver Point, the southern edge of Cannon Beach. Surf Scoters, White-winged Scoters, and a few Red-necked Phalaropes scurried to get out of our way. We also had a flock of Elegant Terns.
That’s also when we started seeing shearwaters. The closer we got to the lighthouse, the more we saw on the water. We glided through flocks of Sooty and Pink-footed Shearwaters as we made our way to the lighthouse.
The captain positioned the boat just off the face of Terrible Tilly so we could watch the sea lions wiggle all over the rock, some sliding down the staircase towards the ocean. We circled the lighthouse a couple of times. A whale spouted not far to the north of us. The whole experience was amazing!
The captain had planned to fish right around the lighthouse, but a mass of jellyfish, called West Coast Sea Nettles, made that unrealistic. So we moved off of Haystack Rock, the more famous of our offshore islands, and the fishers dropped their lines and almost immediately pulled up big rockfish.
Once everyone’s fish limit was caught, we headed off to look at some geological features which happened to host a group of Black Oystercatchers. The ride back was more of the same with scoters, auklets, murres, and a variety of gulls.
It was an incredible trip, and I hope to do it again sometime!
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