The remains of the New Carissa may be stacked up in scrap piles, but it didn’t stack up to the shipwreck George L. Olson — at least as far as a tourist attraction.

“It’s not as big of a turnout for our business,” said Rich Burkholder, the owner of Spinreel Dune Buggy and ATV Rental.  “I would say it was a steady flow of people, but not an onslaught ...”

Spinreel guided tours out to the removal site, similar to the tours the business offered this winter after fierce storms uncovered the Olson buried in sand just down the North Spit from the Carissa. The New Carissa excursions weren’t as popular.

Burkholder said there may have been a few reasons for the smaller turnout for the removal project.

He thinks either folks didn’t know the dismantling was taking place, or they  didn’t realize all the project entailed. The various spit access closures for the snowy plover breeding season and impending jetty repair work may have given people the impression they couldn’t get out to the site. Burkholder said quite often people asked when and whether they could go out.

The lackluster turnout wasn’t just for the tours. U.S. Bureau of Land Management public information officer Megan Harper said people just didn’t turn out in droves like expected. The project staging area and sand road out to the beach and site is on BLM land.

“It ended up being a little quieter this summer,” Harper said.

The less than typical summer weather may be part of the reason people stayed away, she said.

“It was pretty windy and cold a lot of the time out there.”

Three full-time staff members were out on the North Spit this summer, mostly to monitor the snowy plover closures, but also to guide people and offer information. They just didn’t encounter the crowds brought in by the Olson.

That doesn’t mean it was a bad summer.

Most of the tour-takers were from Oregon. People called Spinreel, interested in the tour and the company would assign them a date and time. People from the Willamette Valley or Bend would make arrangements to get on their truck.

Burkholder said visitors had watched the entire saga of the New Carissa or remembered that February day more than nine years ago when it ran aground. They wanted to see it before it was gone. A few had one specific piece of the ship or project they wanted to see.

“People wanted to the see the propellor,” he said.

He said for people from Oregon, it may be nostalgia.

“It sounds funny, but it’s closure for people.”