Seaside, Oregon – Day 2
Exploring Fort Stevens
While visiting with Andy at the bike shop in Seaside, we learned that there are several miles of paved bike trails in Fort Stevens State Park. We decided that would be a great way to explore the historical area so we headed out with the gravel bikes to investigate.
Fort Stevens has an interesting history with the original military defense established during the Civil War. The history of the west coast during Civil War times was new information for us and warrants some research to learn more. Apparently California was a big part of the war, supplying gold to the union, creating the necessity to build defense points along the coast, including a three part defense system at the mouth of the Columbia River, which included Fort Stevens.
This park is really quite large and reminded us of Farragut State Park in Idaho, also a former military base, where we have done many days of hiking, biking and exploring. The Civil War history here is fascinating, but the battery posts from World Wars I & II are pretty amazing to visit. Fort Stevens was actually fired upon by a Japanese submarine during WW II.
Biking
There are just over 9 miles of paved trails in Fort Stevens (map HERE,) with many interesting things to see. We rode a total of around 12 miles, but with all the stops and walkabouts we spent the majority of the day exploring the area.
The trails throughout the park were nicely paved and mostly through a dense rain forest type setting. It was really a gret way to explore this park!
There are also some hiking trails in the park which would be fun to do sometime.