We spent last week on the beautiful Oregon Coast! Brett and I are your typical tropical destination vacationers, so we weren’t quite sure what to expect. There were 8 adults and 8 kids total in our group (4 families), and we rented the most beautiful beach house in Arch Cape. Heres a quick recap of our trip and some fun things to do in Cannon Beach Oregon!

Note: scroll to the very bottom for outfit details!

The Best Things to do in Cannon Beach Oregon

To be honest I had never heard of Cannon Beach until we booked our trip! I mentioned on my Instagram that we were headed to Cannon Beach and was shocked at how many people have been. We flew into Portland and of course we had to make a fun foodie stop before we headed to our beach house. Portland is full of fun local places with amazing food. We had Lardo for lunch, a fun sandwich place with outdoor seating and amazing sandwiches.

We hopped in our Mazda CX-5 Signature and were on our way to Cannon Beach! It was the perfect size for both car seats, our luggage, and our stroller. We loved our car! The features inside the car were amazing, and the views on our drive were beautiful.

Now you may notice that I titled this “trip” recap and not “vacation” recap. A friend once told me “if young kids are traveling with you it is a trip not a vacation.” I couldn’t agree more lol! As much as we love our kids, we really are dying to go on a trip just the two of us. I think it is so good to travel with and without kids. That being said, it was really nice for the kids to entertain each other! We had some beach time each day, and then would warm up in the hot tub. The kids played with kites and built sand castles. Of course along with beach time, we all packed some coordinating family outfits and took turns taking some family pictures of each other.

One of my favorite things to do when I’m traveling is try local restaurants. If you ever ask me to go to a chain restaurant when I’m out of town I will look at you like you are crazy. Here are a few of the restaurants in town that we tried!

Top Restaurants near Cannon Beach Oregon

Pelican Brewing: This is a must. Great menu, big open restaurant if you’re with a group, really cool vibe inside. (I had the Cioppino… so good.)

Creperie: We walked by this cute little place and had to stop in. We had their special which was prosciutto, walnuts, honey, and brie.

Pizza a’fetta: If you want to have a low key night, order this pizza. It was SO good. We called in our order and ate it back at our house. The crab pizza was delicious.

Driftwood: Brett and I took the kids here for dinner one night. I had oysters… when in Rome. The dinner was great, but we really wanted to sit outside. They have a fun deck area but apparently it is a part of their bar. Since we had the kids we sat inside. This restaurant is definitely not big enough for a large group.

Moes: A lot of people recommended Moes! We stopped by but actually ended up not eating there. (I was just in the mood for a lighter meal to be honest and the menu wasn’t speaking to me that night.

Insomnia Coffee: I didn’t actually go in here, but some of the guys went a few times and loved it.

Chocolate Cafe: A fun little place, but keep in mind their chocolate is very bitter, so their menu isn’t as sweet as it sounds. I imagine you could tweak your order but we were a little thrown off by our bitter hot chocolates.

The boys golfed at Manzanita golf course one morning, and then the girls went out for lunch afterwards. We went to Surfbird cafe which was definitely overrated. I personally wouldn’t recommend it, but of course the girl time was fun no matter where we ate.)

Definitely try some clam chowder at some point if you ever find yourself in Cannon Beach!

Visiting Haystack Rock is a must! It was so much cooler than I even imagined! Even driving by was such a cool sight to see.

Things to keep in mind if you’re considering going to Cannon Beach:

• It is a COLD beach! I’ve heard the warmest time to go is in August, but its chilly most months of the year.
• The town closes early. This may change during the warmer months, but we would walk around after dinner and just about everything was closed. It was hard to find an open ice cream shop after 8:00.

Traveling to Cannon Beach was such an affordable trip…The flights were so cheap and splitting a really nice house with 4 families was definitely the way to go. There are other fun sight seeing things to do in Cannon Beach, but we just wanted to keep it low key and easy going with the kids. Going on this trip made me want to explore other (non-tropical) hidden gems to travel to. Let me know if you have any recommendations on where we should explore next!

What we packed for Cannon Beach:

Since it was so cold I only packed one swimsuit for the hot tub. Other than that we packed comfy clothes and a few fun things for pictures! See some of our favorites that we wore from our trip below: