Thor's Well

The well is a collapsed sea cave - a hole in the basalt shelf, perhaps six metres deep, open to the ocean below - and at the right tide each swell surges up through it and then drains back, which reads in photographs as the sea pouring into a bottomless drain. It works best around high tide with a decent swell, and at low tide it is a hole in wet rock doing very little. The rock around it is slick with algae and spray, waves wash the shelf without warning, and sneaker waves on this coast are a genuine and recurring cause of death - people have been swept off here. Spouting Horn and Cook's Chasm nearby work on the same principle. Cape Perpetua rises three hundred metres just behind.

What you actually see

• A collapsed sea cave - filling and draining with each swell.
• Best around high tide - it does very little at low water.
• A slick, wave-washed shelf - where people have been swept off.
• Spouting Horn and Cook's Chasm - the same effect nearby.

When to go

April to October, timed to the tide and swell. Two hours.

Honest expectations

This is genuinely dangerous - sneaker waves have killed people on this shelf. Timing needs both tide and swell, and most visits get neither. The rock is extremely slippery. Never turn your back on the water.

Nearby

Yachats is north; Heceta Head lighthouse is south.