Beach towns (coast or Puget Sound) similar to Seaside, OR? (Seattle: hotels, earthquake)

[jm31828]

My wife and I are fairly new here and were recently down in Seaside, OR- really enjoyed the atmosphere with the boardwalk, the dense little main street with tons of touristy shops and restaurants to walk through. My question is, does Washington have any similar towns on the coast or especially Puget Sound? I know Long Beach is somewhat similar and Ocean Shores is a really scaled back version, but I was curious if we had any other tourist gems like that.

[bloom]

They say not to sleep overnight in these towns due to tsumami.

[jm31828]

Originally Posted by bloom

They say not to sleep overnight in these towns due to tsumami.

That is kind of an ultra-paranoid view since a tsunami is one of those extra rare events that may not happen in the next hundred or 500 years. It's like saying nobody should live in Seattle due to the risk of a major earthquake today, tomorrow, or 300 years from now.

[notnamed]

Long Beach and Ocean Shores are as close as it gets in WA as far as I know. OR coast is just a better experience for places like that.

Personally I don't get people who go to the beach to go shopping.

[CrazyDonkey]

I like Westport, Pacific Beach, and Moclips, and even more so, Rialto Beach, Shi Shi, etc. Don't like Ocean Shores or Seabrook. Washington's coastal beaches, unlike Oregon's, were originally considered to be highways, predating the building of roads along the coast, and cars are still allowed to drive on the beaches along many stretches. If boardwalks and cute shops are your thing, by all means, go to Oregon.

The trick with driving on beaches is to drive far enough to get away from most of the cars, but not so far that you end up getting stuck. Many visitors, when getting stuck, panic and just get stuck even deeper. Locals know better.

[bloom]

Originally Posted by jm31828

That is kind of an ultra-paranoid view since a tsunami is one of those extra rare events that may not happen in the next hundred or 500 years. It's like saying nobody should live in Seattle due to the risk of a major earthquake today, tomorrow, or 300 years from now.

Maybe not ultra-paranoid if you read the New Yorker piece and its follow-up a couple years ago which included some balanced advice such as above to enjoy without paranoia the beach towns during the day, so you can get out of dodge increasingly in daylight than being disoriented in the pitch dark.

[jm31828]

Originally Posted by CrazyDonkey

I like Westport, Pacific Beach, and Moclips, and even more so, Rialto Beach, Shi Shi, etc. Don't like Ocean Shores or Seabrook. Washington's coastal beaches, unlike Oregon's, were originally considered to be highways, predating the building of roads along the coast, and cars are still allowed to drive on the beaches along many stretches. If boardwalks and cute shops are your thing, by all means, go to Oregon.

The trick with driving on beaches is to drive far enough to get away from most of the cars, but not so far that you end up getting stuck. Many visitors, when getting stuck, panic and just get stuck even deeper. Locals know better.

Thanks for the response. My biggest interest is in the nature and scenery so I absolutely love spots like Ruby Beach or Cape Flattery. But after being down there in Seaside I realized I also at times would enjoy the tacky boardwalk/touristy beach town feel and was curious what else we had like that around here.

One thing that surprised me down there, I always thought that driving on the beach was only a Washington thing- but they in fact let you drive on the beach in certain spots down there, too. The flat sand beach from Gerhart all the way up to Warrenton (maybe 5 miles or so) is open to cars.

[jacqueg]

Originally Posted by jm31828

My wife and I are fairly new here and were recently down in Seaside, OR- really enjoyed the atmosphere with the boardwalk, the dense little main street with tons of touristy shops and restaurants to walk through. My question is, does Washington have any similar towns on the coast or especially Puget Sound? I know Long Beach is somewhat similar and Ocean Shores is a really scaled back version, but I was curious if we had any other tourist gems like that.

Poulsbo would be the closest. But it's not all that close.

I dunno why, but Washingtonians don't seem to go in for coast trips the way Oregonians do.

[jacqueg]

Originally Posted by CrazyDonkey

I like Westport, Pacific Beach, and Moclips, and even more so, Rialto Beach, Shi Shi, etc. Don't like Ocean Shores or Seabrook. Washington's coastal beaches, unlike Oregon's, were originally considered to be highways, predating the building of roads along the coast, and cars are still allowed to drive on the beaches along many stretches. If boardwalks and cute shops are your thing, by all means, go to Oregon.

The trick with driving on beaches is to drive far enough to get away from most of the cars, but not so far that you end up getting stuck. Many visitors, when getting stuck, panic and just get stuck even deeper. Locals know better.

Actually, no. Oregon's sand beaches were claimed as highways in the early 1900s, that's why Oregon Parks was part of the Transportation for many decades. This claim underlies Oregon's governmental control of sand beaches. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Beach_Bill

But Washington does allow more driving on the beaches than Oregon does.

[jm31828]

Originally Posted by jacqueg

Poulsbo would be the closest. But it's not all that close.

I dunno why, but Washingtonians don't seem to go in for coast trips the way Oregonians do.

I suspect it's just the proximity? Oregonians live in Portland, Eugene, or Salem for the most part- each of those cities/metro areas are basically just an hour or so from the coast. That makes it insanely easy to spend lots of time at the coast. For us, most live in the Seattle/Tacoma/Everett area- the closest actual coast that we can get to would be Ocean Shores in about a 3 hour drive (give or take a bit depending on which part of the metro area a person is coming from) .

I wondered about this over the last few days- if Seattle was as close to the coast as Portland is, I suspect we'd have one or two really awesome touristy beach towns as well with a boardwalk filled with countless touristy shops, countless hotels and restaurants, etc.