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If you read Installment 7, you know we visited Hurrican Ridge at Olympic National Park (ONP) in the morning. Our plan was to head around to the Sol Duc area to see the hot springs. As we were on our way, we decided to stop at Lake Crescent, also within ONP, to see the lodge and grab lunch.

It’s hard to understand the sheer vastness of ONP. Looking at a map (click on the image at left) might help. But even then, until you are there and experience the size for yourself, it’s hard to imagine the scale. So I decided to copy some map images, one showing the area we covered in WA/OR and one showing the exact same area in the Eastern US, to help give you a better idea.

The park itself is about as big as Central Maryland. And there are no roads that go from one side to the other, because of the mountains, so you have to drive around the perimeter of the park and then into the park’s interior to reach specific points.

We’d driven an hour, at least, to reach Hurricane Ridge. Then we had to exit the park and continue west for another hour to reach Lake Crescent. It would have been at least another 45 minutes to where we were headed in Sol Duc. Which then meant we’d have another two-hour and 45-minute drive to get back to Sequim, which is where we were staying.

We did make a stop to see Madison Creek Falls on the way to Lake Crescent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lovely area, eh? I’m glad we took our time there. But we still had things to see, so off we went to Lake Crescent.

Cute cottages, which are part of the Lake Crescent Lodge complex.

 

 

 

Hubby didn’t feel like exploring the forest trail with us. He found a nice spot to relax, wouldn’t you agree?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were all pretty tired and decided to head back to our rental house. I was very glad to catch the following sunset image from our back deck.

And that ended our day.

I can’t believe I’m only at the end of our fifth full day. There’s much more yet to share.

The next installment will feature images from the Hoh Rain Forest and one of my absolute favorite stops, Rialto Beach.

Don’t forget to check back. Some of those images are amazing…

 

 

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TRIP Re-cap

 

Installment 1: In the Beginning (Friday, August 30 – Monday, Sept 2)

Installment 2: Portland Morning (Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 3: Exploring the City of Portland (morning of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 4: Beyond Portland (afternoon of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 5: Olympic Peninsula, Here We Come!

Installment 6: First Rain Forest Hike & Another Gorgeous Beach

Installment 7: Hurricane Ridge at Olympic National Park

 

Wow, this re-cap is taking a long time. It reminds me of just how much ground we covered and the wide variety of AMAZING stuff we got to see…

At the end of my last post, we’d just arrived in Sequim, Washington, which was to be our “base camp” while visiting Olympic National Park (ONP).

The cool thing about ONP is that it encompasses three distinct ecosystems:  sub-alpine forest, temperate rainforest, and the rugged ocean coast.  On the way to Sequim, we’d stopped and experienced a bit of rain forest AND rocky shore. On this day, it was up to Hurricane Ridge to see that sub-alpine forest and wildflower meadow for ourselves.

 

 

After a quick stop at the Visitor Center just inside the park entrance (near sea level), we got back into the car. That’s when I heard Yves exclaim something like, “What? Look is that?”

He’d mis-read a sign outside of the center. Not because he can’t read English well, he absolutely can, but I guess because he’d read it too quickly.

Those of you not used to visiting national parks in bear country may not realize that backpackers and campers are required to store all food in bear-proof canisters, aka “bear cans,” to keep the bears at bay.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We spent a few hours exploring the Hurricane Ridge area. It was lovely. But we still had more to see. We’d also planned on seeing a couple other areas within ONP, which is HUGE. So off we went.

Pics from that afternoon will be in my next installment.

 

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TRIP Re-cap

 

Installment 1: In the Beginning (Friday, August 30 – Monday, Sept 2)

Installment 2: Portland Morning (Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 3: Exploring the City of Portland (morning of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 4: Beyond Portland (afternoon of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 5: Olympic Peninsula, Here We Come!

Installment 6: First Rain Forest Hike & Another Gorgeous Beach

 

I spent the entire weekend doing yard work, running errands, and doing more yard work. Hard to get caught up on everything!

We left Ocean Shores (layover spot) early on the morning of Thursday, September 5. We were all anxious to get to Olympic National Park.

But first, I wanted to visit the beach. Unfortunately, reaching the sand would have required bushwhacking through that dense brush seen in the photo below.

That’s why the desk clerk looked at me as if I had two heads when I asked her the previous night if I could get to the beach.

She said, “It’s really dark. And you need to follow our beach path.” But I could tell she really wanted to say, “That’s a stupid idea.” I thought to myself, “Don’t Washingtonians like to walk on the beach at night?” I was forgetting that the Pacific Coast, at least in the Northwest, is MUCH wilder than the Atlantic Coast.

As Annelies and I discovered that morning, there was a path, but it wasn’t wide at all. And did require a bunch of ducking and stooping. We reached a little knoll after about 100 yards, saw how far we still had to go, and decided to turn around.

We really were looking forward to seeing Olympic National Park, too. So off we went.

For a change, we let the guys do the driving. Annelies and I rode in the backseat. I was navigating with my Google Maps app and couldn’t resist capturing a screen shot when I saw we were on Kirkpatrick Road.

It only took about an hour and a half to reach Lake Quinault from Ocean Shores.

 

 

 

 

We were undeterred by the rain. I mean, we were about to hike into the Quinault Rainforest, one of only three temperate rainforests in the Western hemisphere. And Annelies and I, being the excellent travel planners, had made sure everyone brought rain gear.

We’d only gone mere steps from the parking lot at the ranger station when we saw this…

 

Wow, right?

I took a ton of pictures during our hike, but am only going to share a choice few here.

 

 

I couldn’t help but think of Robert Frost as soon as I saw that image, which I’m glad I captured. It’s one of my favorites from the trip.

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth…

 

I did tell y’all we laugh a lot when we are together, right? We really do. We have the guys trained to ham it up for the cameras, too.

We were all completely awed and amazed by the rain forest.

 

 

I look like such a dork with my crooked glasses. They’re newish, but have been stepped on and need to be replaced.

 

 

 

I’ll share more rain forest images on Flickr one day.

After we emerged from the rain forest trail, we ate lunch at the lodge. The next photo is another one of my favorites from the trip.

I’d like to be on one of those chairs right now.

We stopped to visit this tree, which is near the lodge, then were on our way to Kalaloch (pronounced like “clay-lock”) Beach.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We probably spent a good hour or more exploring. I love beaches! Although there was still one left to see nearby (Ruby Beach), the sun was setting, and we still had about a 2.5-hour drive to get to Sequim.

We actually got to Sequim just as the sun was setting. We were all so bushed, we opted to order pizza for dinner.

Yet another awesome rental property.

More on Olympic National Park in Installment 7…

 

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TRIP Re-cap

 

Installment 1: In the Beginning (Friday, August 30 – Monday, Sept 2)

Installment 2: Portland Morning (Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 3: Exploring the City of Portland (morning of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 4: Beyond Portland (afternoon of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 5: Olympic Peninsula, Here We Come!

 

Even if Portland wasn’t our favorite destination during this vacation, as you saw in the last few installments (see list at bottom of this post to go back), we still had a good time.

One thing we do a whole lot of when traveling with Annelies and Yves is laugh. We really have fun together. So even a bad day is a good day. Know what I’m saying? And so-so days are grand.

Anyway… I was very excited on the morning of September 4 because I knew we were headed for the coast. I LOVE the Oregon coast. Love, love, love it!

Our first stop of the day, though, was a place our Victorian’s owner told us about… the International Rose Test Garden. He emphasized that it was a great place to get a view of Mount Hood. It was sort of on our way anyway, and there was no admission fee, so we decided to stop for a visit.

 

Unfortunately, as you’ll see in the image shown below, the cloud cover and/or fog was too thick to see the mountain.

We did see lots of gorgeous roses, though. I took quite a few pictures. Sadly, I had a blonde moment in the car and deleted about two-thirds of the images I captured there.

 

That’s why you only see pink roses here. Oh well…

Sure I was upset, but we were headed for the Oregon coast. The loss of images was completely offset by my joy knowing we’d be at the coast soon.

Our first order of business was to find a spot for lunch, which we did, just south of Cannon Beach along US 101.

We were all starving, but visited the beach first.

 

 

 

 

 

After a lovely bread, cheese, fruit, and wine picnic, we headed back north to see Cannon Beach.

Cannon Beach is a cute beach town, but I remember it best for Haystack Rock, a sea stack that rises 235 feet out of the sand and the sea at the low tide line. Haystack Rock and the area around it are abundant with sea life in tide pools, which I also love.

Sea stacks are geological land forms consisting of a steep, often vertical column or columns of rock in the sea near a coast, isolated by erosion. Stacks are formed by time, wind, and water, which separate the stack from the headland.

That’s not a great picture, since I was shooting through fog into the sun, but it gives you a better idea of the scale of Haystack Rock.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I could spend DAYS exploring beaches, but we had places to go. We still had to get to Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. Our destination for the night was Ocean Shores, Washington. Just a stopover, really.

Speaking of stopovers… I had to pose for a photo op here after seeing Warrenton, Oregon on the map (I live in Warrenton, VA).

After a very quick stop, we continued north. We crossed the Columbia River on a steel truss bridge that spans the river between Astoria, Oregon and Point Ellice near Megler, Washington. I didn’t know at the time that the bridge, which is 4.1 miles (6.6 km) long, was the last-completed segment of US-101 between Olympia, Washington, and Los Angeles, California, and is the longest continuous truss bridge in North America.

We were going to stop for pics of the bridge, but couldn’t find a convenient place. Knowing we still had a ways to go, we continued on our way.

We made one brief, but important stop in Long Beach, Washington for this photo op…

…after Annelies told me she’d never seen or been photographed with anything labeled “world’s biggest.”

With another 2.5 hours of drive time between Long Beach and Ocean Shores, we didn’t reach our destination until after dark. So that’s the end of the images from September 4.

The next installment will introduce you to the amazing sights we saw in Olympic National Park. Y’all come back now, y’hear?

 

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TRIP Re-cap

 

Installment 1: In the Beginning (Friday, August 30 – Monday, Sept 2)

Installment 2: Portland Morning (Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 3: Exploring the City of Portland (morning of Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 4: Beyond Portland (afternoon of Tuesday, Sept 3)

 

Continued from Pacific Northwest – Installment 3…

After lunch, we skedaddled out of the city and headed east into the Columbia River Gorge (CRG) National Scenic Area. According to the Forest Service’s CRG web site…

The Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area encompasses 292,500 acres, running from the mouth of the Sandy River to the mouth of the Deschutes and spanning southern Washington and northern Oregon. The Gorge is unique in its natural and cultural history, as well as its designation as a National Scenic Area.

That’s a pretty big area. We could easily spend a week exploring it all. We didn’t have that much time, of course. But Annelies and I both new we just HAD to see Multnomah Falls. The falls are 620 feet high, which makes it the highest waterfall in the Columbia River Gorge.

The image posted above was take from the base. This place is pretty close to the road, which makes it very easy to get to and VERY popular. Even off-season, there are lots of people.

We did walk up to the bridge you see in the first shot to get a closer look at the upper falls…

… and the gorge.

The lighting was better on the bridge, so we got a few good people shots, too.

 

Yves loves reading informational signs.

After coming down from the falls trail, we walked under the nearby Union Pacific train track. I’m glad no train passed while we were that close to the tracks. That would have been LOUD!

Once we’d seen enough of the falls and gotten our fill of people-watching, we headed back toward Portland. There were a couple of stops planned from there. The first was the Vista House scenic overlook.

 

 

 

 

The second planned stop, still a bit further west, was the Portland Women’s Forum Stace Scenic Viewpoint. (If you must know about the odd name of that place, CLICK HERE.)

While there, we had time for a group shot. To get the lighting right, we had to sit facing the sun (sort of), which is why we all look squinty.

From there, we went to Costco. We really know how to show people a good time!

I wanted to see if they sold Blue Crab meat. They didn’t. But we did buy some thick NY Strip steaks for dinner. And Annelies bought a new suitcase. Yves wanted to buy a new car. But we talked him out of it.

Then we went to a regular grocery store before heading back to the house where Yves cooked us dinner.

That ended our last full day in Portland…

Next up, visiting the Oregon Coast!

🙂

 

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TRIP Re-cap

 

Installment 1: In the Beginning (Friday, August 30 – Monday, Sept 2)

Installment 2: Portland Morning (Tuesday, Sept 3)

Installment 3: Exploring the City of Portland (morning of Tuesday, Sept 3)