Have you been to Cannon Beach, Oregon with its iconic Haystack Rock?
I'd argue it's the most fantastic beach on the West Coast... as long as you hit the right weather - from mid-July to mid-October where it can be amazing... or romantically misty.
In a strange ecological turn, huge Roosevelt elk have started wandering onto Cannon Beach at twilight, as seen in the photo above I took last week.
Cannon Beach has been our big annual family vacation for almost 50 years, and we've only just started seeing elk on the beach the last two summers. Experts think the local elk population has been stable, but that the local elk have just gotten less shy.
As a big Cannon Beach fan, I was excited to honor it with our new Erin Hanson's Sunset Reflections puzzle, clocking in at 795 pieces (and a pricey $200!) this is a project puzzle:
We just released this one late spring, and no one's reviewed in on the Artifact Puzzles webpage yet, but there is a copy circulating in the Hoefnagel Puzzle Club, and Hoefnagel members have so far voted it:
- Hardest (1.0).
- Most Fun (5.0).
One club member has reviewed it and says, “It takes a while because there are a lot of pieces but it’s not very challenging. The top part of the sky is darker than this picture makes it look. I work puzzles without seeing the picture and I was guessing the colorful parts must be the clouds in the sky so the darkish blue and purplish stuff must be water so I had that part nearly done before I realized I was doing it upside down!” — Michael, WA
“It takes a while because there are a lot of pieces but it’s not very challenging. The top part of the sky is darker than this picture makes it look. I work puzzles without seeing the picture and I was guessing the colorful parts must be the clouds in the sky so the darkish blue and purplish stuff must be water so I had that part nearly done before I realized I was doing it upside down!” — Michael, WA
What an amazing photo of Cannon Beach!! To see the elk wandering along the beach is a big surprise. We also went annually for many years to Cannon Beach, mainly to watch the puffins nesting on Haystack Rock; we timed our visits for the negative, low tides and spent hours with our spotting scope on the beach observing these beautiful birds on the rock. We stopped going a few years ago, but now we want to get back and see this next natural wonder. In the meantime, we will have satisfy ourselves with Erin Hanson’s lovely Artifact Puzzle.