Riding the Dunes!

There is a 50 mile stretch of real sand dunes that runs from Florence, OR to Coos Bay, OR.  We kept seeing "Dune Buggy Tours" listed on all of the brochures, so Alan checked it out and signed us up. 

 

 

This is what I was expecting:

 

 

 

A nice ride over the Dunes with 30 or so other old foggies!

 

 

 

 

 

This is what I got!

 

 

 

Sand Rail Buggy ride!

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm about to be strapped in this thing.  At this point we have already been told how we should only bother our driver if we were about to puke.........and, that we would probably be sand blasted while on this ride.

He's kidding.  Right?  Now I'm getting worried.

 

 

 

 

 We are on our way out to the dunes.  It only took about 5 minutes from the parking lot to the wide open dunes.  We rode the dunes for about 20 minutes before heading out to the  beach.

 

 

The brochure warns you about sand in your camera, so we didn't take many pictures while riding.  It was smooth riding along the hard packed beach, so we were able to take out the camera.   It was so pretty riding out by the beach.

 

 

 

 

 

 Our driver stopped to take pictures for everyone. 

 

 

 

 

After the beach, we headed back to the dunes for another 20 minutes or so of fun!

 

 

 

 

We are sitting at the top of this really high sand dune one minute......the next minute we are over the side.  Straight down the side at a high rate of speed! 

We were told that the highest dune we rode was 300 feet and the fastest we went was 60 MPH.

 

The wind wasn't blowing hard this particular morning so we were lucky not to have been sand blasted......and no one got sick!  It was a lot of fun!  Didn't know I had that "Extreme Gene"!

 

 

 

 

 

Heading  back in....we had to stop for this one heading out.  It was a one way dune buggy road.

 

 

 

 

 

We made it back and we are checking out our ride!

 

 

 

Can we go again?

 

 

 

 

 

Another fun day!  Here is a link to their website.  You can see a video of the sand rail in action.......as we saw it!  Scroll down on their website to see the video.  Be sure the volume is turned up!

 

http://www.sandland.com/sandrail-tours/

 

 

 

Because of the long stretch of coastal dunes (50 miles), this is a favorite activity for the entire family.  There are numerous county and/or state parks where you can bring your ATV or Sand Rail to ride the dunes.   The campgrounds are full with people coming to ride the dunes.  Here are some we saw while riding around.