This website supplements my guidebook "Day Hiking: Oregon Coast."
It is not meant to be a stand-alone guide to the OCT! But this website + my guidebook Day Hiking: Oregon Coast provides the most detailed guidance available to thru-hikers at this time. It also replaces my blog, which you can still access for archival info (though some of it is pretty dated).
The book was my attempt to convey as much info as I could about thru-hiking the OCT within the covers of a book mainly focused on day hiking. It was not a perfect fix. Therefore ...
I'm working on a new guidebook!
Hiking the Oregon Coast Trail will be available in September 2021. It is designed as a guide for thru-hikers and section hikers, with more emphasis on camping options, boat shuttles, and other details backpackers and inn-to-inn hikers need than you can find in Day Hiking: Oregon Coast. It will include everything in this website and lots more (except trail condition updates, which I plan to continue to post here).
OCT Overview and Updates
Introduction to the Oregon Coast Trail
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
Introduction to the Oregon Coast Trail
The Oregon Coast isn't a wilderness. But hiking the Oregon Coast Trail is an adventure. Read about season, direction of travel, and other quirks and key info.
Section 1: Columbia River to Garibaldi
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
Introduction to the Oregon Coast Trail
The start of the OCT (yes, you definitely should hike southbound) has beaches, headlands, everything--but limited legal camping presents challenges.
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
A half-dozen gorgeous headlands, long beaches, camping and lodging options, and limited highway walking if you study the route carefully.
Section 3: Siletz Bay to Florence
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
Section 2: Garibaldi to Siletz Bay at Lincoln City
A great stretch with fabulous views and good lodging and camping, diminished only by a couple of long stretches of highway walking.
Section 4: Florence to Port Orford
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
The most remote stretch of the OCT, ideal for backpacking, with a couple of bay mouth crossings--one easy to wrangle, one more challenging.
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
Section 5: Port Orford to the border
Amazing views in this least-developed stretch of the Oregon Coast, but limited lodging and some camping challenges, and some long highway hiking.
About the Author
Journalist and Avid Hiker
Bonnie Henderson has been backpacking on and writing about the Oregon Coast Trail since 2008. She is the author of three guidebooks: Day Hiking: Oregon Coast, Best Hikes with Kids: Oregon (with Zach Urness), and Hiking the Oregon Coast Trail (coming in September 2021), all from Mountaineers Books. She is also the author of two nonfiction books: The Next Tsunami: Living on a Restless Coast and Strand: An Odyssey of Pacific Ocean Debris, both from Oregon State University Press. She lives in Eugene, Oregon. Follow her work at bonniehendersonwrites.com.