A 100-acre finger of old lava that extends a mile into the Pacific, Yaquina Head offers both human and natural history. Through high-quality exhibits and numerous videos, the Yaquina Head Interpretive Center (opened in 1997) provides an overview of the headland, from the seabirds that flock there every spring to the Indians who lived there 4,000 years ago. Just south of the interpretive center lies the Quarry Cove Intertidal Area, billed as the world's only wheelchair-accessible tide-pool site. At the tip of the headland stands Yaquina Head Lighthouse (1873), its 93ft height making it the tallest lighthouse in Oregon (visit by guided tour only, Jul-mid-Sept daily 10am-4pm; rest of the year daily noon-4pm weather permitting). From platforms near the lighthouse visitors can look down on Colony Rock, a mere 100 yards away. From April through June thousands of common murres, cormorants, seagulls and other nesting seabirds turn Colony Rock into a preening, squabbling, feeding, flapping riot. In contrast, the marine gardens below the lighthouse parking lot, at Cobble Beach, remain quiet and tranquil, except for the rumble of the surf and the wind-chime tinkling the cobbles make when pushed around by the waves. Look for the Bureau of Land Management naturalists, who will tell you about the sunflower stars, gumboot chitons, kelp crabs and other denizens of these tide pools-and teach you how to explore the rocky intertidal zone without harming yourself or the plants and animals that live there.