Visiting Toledo
View our Toledo Centennial Mosaic Mural — Largest outdoor mosaic mural in the Northwest! Shop for antiques & gifts. Dine in a cozy restaurant. Enjoy river recreation. Go birdwatching. Visit art galleries. Check out the Railroad Heritage Display. Explore Toledo History Center. Skate at Toledo’s state-of-the-art Skatepark. Go Bowling Golf at Olalla Valley Golf Course. Go swimming at Toledo’s Municipal Pool. Take a scenic drive down the Yaquina Bay Road. Enjoy our community events. Go Kayaking or fishing from our public boat launches at South Bay Road, Cannon Quarry Park, or Elk City Campground.
The City of Toledo has polishing its downtown and inviting residents and visitors into town with special decorations and events. The downtown offers a five-block easily walked area, including two observation decks on Main Street for views of Toledo’s riverfront and heritage train display. From May to October the town’s core is blooming with more than sixty hanging flower baskets of unusual size and beauty which bloom continually throughout the season. The baskets are donated by community members and businesses and organizations and have been favorably compared to those in Victoria, B.C.
The flower plantings grow to more than two feet in width and can nearly trail to the sidewalks. A Wednesday street market is held each week in the summer on Toledo’s downtown sidewalks, bringing shoppers to stroll the street and purchase fresh produce, flowers, baked goods and local handcrafts. Local musicians play live music at noon on the north Main Street deck during the market. In the fall, the downtown is decorated with fall-themed grapevine wreaths and many businesses and local groups create scarecrow displays during Toledo’s Scarecrow Festival.
Residents and visitors enjoy discovering the inventive displays, from scarecrow linemen at the local utility office to scarecrow engineers at the display of “One Spot”, Toledo’s 1922 Baldwin Steam Engine, the last steam logger in Oregon now on permanent display near Toledo’s waterfront. A dedicated group of railroad historians, Yaquina Pacific Railroad Historical Society, has installed the engine, an RPO mail car, and a restored 1906 wooden caboose near Toledo Post Office. The society is restoring the mail car to be used as a railroad interpretive museum, including a restoration of the mail sorting section of the car.
The volunteers are available to answer questions each Saturday as they continue their work interpreting the rail history of Lincoln County. Christmas finds Toledo beautifully decorated with large lighted wreaths donated and decorated by community members. Businesses and organizations create lighted displays for the enjoyment of all. A lighted holiday parade gets everyone into the spirit on the second Saturday in December during Toledo’s Hometown Holiday. In February, residents may publicly declare their devotion by having their sweetheart’s name inscribed on one of the “street valentines” which adorn each downtown street lamp.
A number of artists have made their homes in Toledo, converting downtown commercial space and residential space into studio/living space with retail shops on the street level. Landscape artists Ivan Kelly, Michael Gibbons, live here as well as metal sculptor Sam Briseno, potter Jean Inglis, and contemporary artist Jon Zander. The artists hold open studios during Art Walk each year, held over Labor Day weekend. Other annual events include Toledo Summer Festival, celebrating the timber industry roots of the town in July, and the Antique Street Fair in August. The fireworks display at the Toledo Summer Festival is the best small town display in the Northwest. The Summer Festival includes a great parade, logging show, carnival, dances, and a “potty race”, in which teams race specially constructed “racing commodes”. The Antique Street Fair on the first Sunday in August sees Main Street converted into a pedestrian zone for the day as antique dealers from all over the Northwest set up booths along the street for the day. A quilt show and a folk music festival accompany the fair, and classic car owners show their antique and classic cars. The railroad society puts on a demonstration of all their restored equipment during the street fair, encouraging folks to try out the velocipede (a bicycle with an outrigger that runs on the tracks) and take a ride on the restored sixteen man crew car. Toledo Folk Music Club brings folk musicians from around the country and the world to Toledo for intimate “house concerts”. The club schedules concerts at a local church, and also organizes music for the Antique Street Fair and noon concerts at the street market each Wednesday in the summer.
Toledo restaurants offer traditional American diner style menus at Timbers & Main street as well as flavorful slow smoked meats at Stu Miller’s Pigfeathers Barbeque. Chef’s Place offers wonderful in-season specials, La Roca Mexican Restaurant and Golden Dragon Chinese Food offer ethic favorites. Toledo enjoys warm temperatures in summer in its sheltered location on the Yaquina River six miles inland from Newport. River recreation is accessible from the Port of Toledo’s public boat launch on South Bay Road just south of Toledo. The port developed Toledo’s waterfront by installing a viewing platform over Depot Slough near the port office on First Street, and constructing a boardwalk along the riverfront during 2004. Upriver, fishing and kayaking are favorite sports on the Yaquina and Big Elk Rivers.
County parks offer boat launching, picnic facilities and camping upriver from Toledo on the way to Elk City. The river offers beautiful scenery and birdwatching and cycling opportunities along the North Yaquina Bay Road, which begins in Toledo and follows the river to Yaquina Bay in Newport following the original path of the Oregon Pacific Railroad, the first transit route into Lincoln County built in the 1880’s. Freight trains still come to Toledo daily on one of the most used short line rails in Oregon.
The Toledo Hauler services Georgia-Pacific Toledo, LLC in Toledo, the second largest employer in Lincoln County. GP Toledo mill is the “top recycler” in the state, using 1 billion pounds of used cardboard to make containerboard each year. Toledo’s harbor is home to Yaquina Boat Equipment and Pacific Coast Boats, Inc. building custom catamarans. The inland harbor offers sheltered moorage at the Port of Toledo’s docks. Settled in 1866, Toledo shows its historical roots in its downtown, where many buildings date from the early 1900’s. City Hall was built in 1939 in the art deco style, and houses Toledo History Museum, open from 8 am to 5 pm Monday through Thursday. Toledo History Center is open at 208 S. Main Street, displaying a variety of artifacts and pictures fom Toledo’s timber, railroad, boat building and dairy farm roots.