Lisa, Lee, Brad and Tom played golf at Bandon Crossings GC in the morning, a very nice, relatively new track about five miles from the Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, with which it is not affiliated. Bandon Crossings was a nice change of pace from the Bandon Dunes courses. A few miles inland, the temperature at Crossings was about 15 degrees warmer than the ocean-side, wind swept Bandon Dunes courses. Bandon Crossings is not a links-style course, so another contrast was the comparatively lush vegetation and forests that fringed the course.
After golf, we met Georgia for lunch in the little Coquille River front village of Bandon-by-the Sea. We chose Tony's Crab Shack as our dining venue, where we enjoyed fresh local seafood. In the afternoon, Georgia and Tom went to Face Rock scenic overlook, which provided spectacular views of the many dramatic rock formations that spring up from the Pacific's floor, just offshore. In the late afternoon, we drove northwest of Bandon to Bullard's Beach State Park, where Tom encountered a baby seal, waiting for it's mother to return from the Pacific with a fish dinner. After shooting several close up photos of the cute little creature, a Park Ranger came running out to advise Tom that it was illegal in Oregon to get within 50 yards of a marine mammal and the consequences included stiff fines and imprisonment! After Tom pleaded ignorance, which came naturally, the Ranger sent him on his way, to the great relief of the baby seal.