July
28th – 31st2017
We left Port Angles, Washington to embark on our
second phase of the trip. It mentally
feels that we are “on our way home” even though we won’t be back for another
couple of months. 71 days to be exact.  |
| Route from Port Angeles, Washington to La Push |
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| The drive from Port Angeles to La Push was beautiful as we passed by Crescent Lake with it's emerald waters. This time the wind was not so high that the white caps disguised the color of the lake. |
This campground was somewhere in the middle. The lucky few enjoyed sites on the beach,
which was, where I thought our reservation was for. Located directly on what is called “First Beach”
it was all about the beach for the majority here.
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| We discovered a slight leak the last time it rained, a couple of months ago. Today was the first day with the right conditions so Norm got up on the roof with the hose trying to determine where it might be. No luck. Notice the Tsunami siren behind him. They test it once a month. Thank goodness it wasn't when he was up there! |
Our site was
directly below a Tsunami Siren, but luckily that was not heard. What we did hear, however, was non-stop
barking. Big dog barks, small yippy dog
barking, and the frequent sounds of dogfights.
All day, and most the night.
Owners would sit beside their campers drinking, and
positively ignore their dog carrying on for hours. One night, after midnight, I really wanted to
go out and see the moon reflect on the ocean. But since the dogs were finally
quiet, I hated to rile them all up again.
I am sorry, but it is not fair. I
love dogs, my dad bred them and I tell you, they were trained not to bark. It can be done.
Late the first afternoon we took a long walk on the
beautiful beach all the way to the end. Norm and I are not tremendous beach
lovers, but you could not help but take in the sights and sounds of this
gorgeous place.
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| First Beach in La Push. Our campground is down the end right on the water. Our site, however, was a little set back. |
The next morning, about 6:30 the goal was to head to
Hoh Rain Forest. I had packed our
breakfasts and lunches plus hiking and camera gear the night before. As we were about to leave, I couldn’t find my
cellphone ( camera ) anywhere! After
searching high and low, I had to assume I dropped it somewhere on the miles of
rocky beach the night before!
I tried technology first. “Find my phone” app told me they could not
locate my phone. Well, that makes two of us. After calling it on Norm’s phone I realized it
behaved as if dead. Oh, no! Technology, I learned, is only good if there
is battery power!
We took off and combed miles of beach for well over an
hour. As time progressed, I became
worried that someone picked it up and might have either been accessing my info,
or just calling their friends all over the world.
When we got
back, Norm took apart the couch to see if it had, indeed, fallen “between the
cracks”. Yeah! My hero!
There it lay, with its battery dead as a doornail, but looking beautiful
nonetheless!
How have we become so dependent on these small,
electronic devises? Jeez! I knew I could live without it. But I would
feel even more out of touch with family than I do already traveling this far,
for this long. The camera in this
light, waterproof devise is amazing.
Almost all the photos in my blog are from this silly phone! Plus it’s so darn easy to carry!
Thanks to me, we had missed the window of opportunity to
hike this magnificent temperate rain forest sans crowds, so we decided to wait
and try again tomorrow. We will set our clocks, one more day!
Most of the beaches along the coast afford the best
viewing, walking and beachcombing during low tide. Trying to hike the rainforest that was over
an hour drive to the east and the same day we wanted to get to the famous Ruby
Beach that was about the same distance south, was probably impossible with the
current tide schedule.
Since the rain forest was out, we headed south. Ruby Beach, which I not only read, but was
told not to miss, was unbelievably beautiful. Ruby Beach is part of the Olympic
National Park and named for the rose-colored ruby fragments found dispersed
among the grey sand. We didn’t recognize at ruby fragments, while there,
however.
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| Ruby Beach is littered with huge logs, but once past them, it was one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. |
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| Thousands of sea anemones were along the base of the rocks, many with crabs. We never realized that ate that way! |
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| We have never seen so many sea creatures before! And the sea stars! Wow! Hundreds of them, all different colors! |
The surf appeared to be a mesmerizing pink, but we
wondered if that could just be our imagination playing tricks on us in this
incredible place. It must be the ruby
fragments.
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| The water here at Ruby Beach really did have a red tint to it! |
There was a lot to see, and although I could have
spent days here drinking in the sea, surf and sun it was time to move on.
Heading south again, we stopped to witness nature at
its weirdest. ( is that a word?). A
little more south, still in Olympic National Park, lies Kalaloch Lodge, where
lives a massive tree that has survived decades without soil feeding or
supporting its roots. A freak of nature?
Perhaps. Down on the beach, The Tree of Life aka “Tree Root Cave”, erosion has stripped this tree of all apparent
life support, yet it appears to thrive on air alone!
Norm and I took the short beach walk to the tree and
took pictures to authenticate its existence.
We ate our lunches a few yards away and watched the shoreline for a
glimpse of the whales another couple told us they had just seen.
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| The "Tree of Life" is somehow thriving without apparent soil to nourish or even support it! How weird! |
After watching for about ½ hour, we laid in the warm
sand for a quick nap. Listening to Norm softly
snore, I decided to resume my vigil for whales.
I didn’t believe my eyes as I saw a small pod just off shore. Was I
dreaming? Did I nod off to sleep?
Not 2
seconds after waking Norm, a huge whale ( I think it was a humpback Norm
insists it was an Orca ) rose out of the surf about 100 yards off shore and
suspended there - with its massive jaws open for long enough to not only give
me time to get my camera, but to take a picture! ( Although not a great one. )
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| What do you think? Orca or Humpback? Can you believe how close to shore it is? Wow! |
We stayed quite a while after that, catching glimpses
of them while hoping for another Kodak moment.
No breaching, but it was fun just waiting and watching.
From there we headed back toward the campground
stopping at the Forks Timber Museum. Back
in the 1970’s, Forks was considered the “Logging Capitol of the World”. This
museum, presented in a log cabin built by local volunteers and the High School
Carpentry Class of 1989, told of the history of homesteading, farming and
logging in the Pacific Northwest.
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| The Forks Timber Museum was small but packed with a lot of authentic equipment and information regarding the life and times of lumberjacks. The museum also focused on the history of the local logging trade. |
The town of Forks has evidently become famous due to
the novel series “Twilight” and the movie of the same name. There is “Twilight” everything in town. Hotel
rooms with a Twilight theme, Twilight menu’s, Twilight gifts and mementos of
every variety. Tee shirts, sweat shirts, Subway even has a “Twilight” sandwich!
Norm and I had not read or even heard of the series,
so it was lost on us. Too bad, it could have
been fun since we were right there amongst the supernatural.
With nothing much more of interest in the tiny town of
Forks, we then headed back to make dinner and watch the thick fog roll in with
the surf. Rather cool.
The next day things went a lot better. About 6:45 we were out the door heading to
another part of the vast Olympic National Park.
Hoh Rainforest, with its 140-160 inches of rainfall each year is
considered to be one of the finest examples of a temperate rainforest in the
world. With many beautiful areas in this
park, Hoh Rainforest should not be missed.
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| These mature trees, if you notice, are wrapped around a "nurse log". Hemlock and Spruce seedlings unable to survive on the forest floor, absorb nutrients, moisture and warmth from a decaying log. Only a few seedlings survive. After the tree roots hit soil, new trees seem to stand on stilts as the log decays away. Fascinating! |
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| These tree roots are HUGE! |
As soon as we arrived we ate our cereal that we
packed, and hiked the trails marveling over the huge trees covered in moss and
the tropical ferns on the forest floor.
Spotting a couple of Roosevelt Elk made our early morning trek complete.
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| Norm walks along a path in the Hoh Rainforest of Olympic National Park in Washington |
Once back in the parking lot we found the crowds had
arrived while; we had enjoyed our solitude on the trails.
On the way back to LaPush, we stopped at John’s Beachcomber Museum in Forks where
a man displays his treasures that he has collected for the last 40 years from
the local beaches.
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| You can't miss this place as you drive down the side road the Beachcomber Museum is on! Wow! What a lot of buoys! This fellow, John, has been collecting for 40 years! |
There was a huge
section of the barn that was dedicated to the items found from Japan. Tsunami debris of every type. Also of
interest was the Naval weaponry, and the hundreds of glass balls found.
I found
particular interest in the display of “messages in bottles” that he found. The notes were neatly placed in a notebook
for all to read. Quite a few were from
Navymen, and others from children doing a class project.
The Raggedy Ann doll heads were a little
creepy, as was the locked cabinet displaying medical waste. I overheard his wife say that “Finders
keepers” is the rule among Beachcombers. John found one man’s left shoe on one
beach, and months later a friend found the right shoe on a beach 100 miles
away!
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| Just one of the strange items found along the beach |
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| These doll heads are just a little creepy! |
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| Norm standing in awe as he looks around this Beachcombers Museum in Forks, Washington. The more you look, the more amazed you are at the items this fellow has found on the local beaches. A tremendous amount has washed ashore from the Japanese Tsunami. |
We headed back to camp after enjoying a very diverse
day.
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| The area covered in Western Washington from our base camp in Quileute Oceanside Resort in La Push. |
