Training for volunteer whale watchers opens Dec. 5 and 6 in Newport for the winter Whale Watch Week that runs Dec. 26 through Jan. 1.

Southern Oregon windsurfing and kite-boarding fans needn't travel all the way to the Columbia Gorge to find first-rate playgrounds.

While clams may not be everyone's meal of choice, there are a lot of Oregonians who enjoy digging them out of our coastal beaches.

NEWPORT — Oregon's growing fleet of Pacific halibut anglers will see its quota cut by more than 20 percent this year after the International Pacific Halibut Commission juggled its allocation formulas, much to the detriment of local fishermen.

BROOKINGS — Oregon's pleasure-boat fleet is about to embark on the most bountiful ocean-fishing season for fin-clipped hatchery coho salmon in 17 years.

The greatest show on surf returns to the Oregon Coast this week as the annual spring migration of gray whales returns the state's shores.

From five miles away, the New Dungeness Light Station looks as small as a bar of soap in the shape of a lighthouse. That's the kind of gift — lighthouse refrigerator magnets, lighthouse candles, lighthouse candy bars — my family has been giving me since I developed this thing for lighthouses.

If you missed the southbound whale run in January, one of the best months in the year for whale watching, get ready for March and April. That's when up to 18,000 of the world's largest mammals begin their annual parade up the coast to their Arctic home waters.

The start was a little disappointing, but now the crabbing season is getting back up to speed along the Oregon Coast.

NEWPORT — Whale experts are ready and waiting for a week of wild weather to relent in time for Oregon's annual Winter Watch.

They come without warning, sneaking up on their victims during some of the happiest moments of their lives, and they are killing Oregonians at the highest rate since 2000.