A gold metal for Olympic National Park!

On our way out of Seattle we got a late start with all the laundry and grocery shopping, so we got to our first campsite at Olympic around 7:00pm.  Well since it was Saturday night all the campsites in the park where already full.  So we headed to a campsite just outside of the park to spend one night there.  The next day we went first to the visitor center of the park to decide where we wanted to camp.  We ended up going to the Sol Duc Campsite since it has the reputation to be very beautiful. We found an awesome site and quickly set up camp before heading out to our first hike.  This hike left right from the campsite and went to Sol Duc Falls, it was about 6 miles round trip.  This hike was totally different than any of the mountain hikes we had done before.  The trees are primarily Douglas Firs and are HUGE.  Since we are so close to the rainforest then it really feels like this type of landscape.  So we enjoyed the hike out and the falls were amazing.  We took the ‘Lovers Lane’ hike back which follows the river where sometime salmon can be seen spawning. 

We passed by the lodge at the end of the hike where they have hot springs pools that you can swim in.  That night we went to the ranger presentation that talked about how they are going to be tearing down the two dams that are blocking the Elwhar River.  These were built early on in the 1900’s and now it is known that these are preventing the salmon from coming upstream to spawn.  The electricity that these dams are producing are so minimal that it will not have an huge impact to tear them down.  The next day we decided to take the car and go exploring around the area.   First we stopped at the Salmon Cascades on the Sol Duc river where the salmon can be seen jumping out of the water to make it to the top of the waterfall. 

We drove on to the oceanfront outside of the park.  We were hoping to find a nice seafood restaurant with a view on the ocean but surprisingly there was nothing but two diners serving fish and chips.  So we decided to do a picnic on the beach instead.  There was a stand selling fresh smoked salmon so we picked up this along with some bread, white wine, beers, and homemade salsa.  We set up our little ‘restaurant’ on the beach and had an awesome feast.  It was a beautiful day so we spent the afternoon on the beach (I even took a little nap!).  It was really nice and we had this spectacular view all to ourselves!  We had the view on the Strait of Juan de Fuca with the mountains in the distance surrounding Victoria, BC.  Tomorrow we are heading to another campsite that is on the beach on the west side of the peninsula that is also within the park. 

The next day we headed to Mora Campsite that is near the ocean front.  The campsite was nice but when we headed out to the most picturesque beach in the area, Rialto Beach, it was immerged in a giant cloud of fog.  So we couldn’t really get a good view but it was pretty cool anyhow. 

We saw the city that is inside an Indian reservation called La Push which is basically just fisherman and not much else, then we headed to a nearby hike.  All along the coast line there is a continuous trail that goes from just hiking on the beach to the forest and back again.  We hiked out to second beach which brings you first through the thick forest and out onto this big beautiful beach which is only accessible on foot.  There are quite a few back country campers that hike and camp along the coast here which looked pretty cool to spend the night on the beach.  The sun was hot but that water was FREEZING!!  Antoine jumped in anyways and was surprised to see a seal swimming nearby.  Looking out in the water you could see the seals poking their heads up here and there, it was very cool.  We walked along the beach and Elisabeth found a starfish.  It was a beautiful spot so we hung out for a while before heading back down the trail. 

The next day we headed out to the next campsite, anxious to go see the rainforest portion of the park – Hoh Rainforest.  This is a temperate rainforest and is well known for its elk population.  We did see a whole herd of elk when we first came into the park but these were the only ones we saw here.

  The first day we were there we did a ranger led hike on the spruce trail.  It was really interesting because he talked about the way the ecosystem worked in a temperate rainforest and also the various trees.  There were a lot of spruce, Douglas Fir, and some maple.  The forest was covered in a thick layer of moss and lichen which made it very green and beautiful. 

We had met the family next to us earlier that day, they had a little girl, Piper, who would turn 4 the next day and a 10 year old boy named Kelly.  Monte and Brit were from Portland so they gave us some good pointers on places to see in the city once we got there.  We got back to the campsite not too late so the kids could play, which freed up some time for Antoine to go running and me to read my book (The Kite Runner – An awesome read!). 

The next day we did a long hike on the Hoh River Trail which you could potentially take for over 26 miles or something crazy, we didn’t go this far!   But we did go about 7 miles out which made for a good hike around 14 miles round trip.  Antoine carried Elisabeth a good chunk of that hike and so we were happy to get back to the campsite that night to relax!!  The trail was really pretty and there were a lot of back country campers that go out there and hike out to Mount Olympus.  We were hoping to come across some elk but the only wildlife we saw was a snake on the trail.  Now on to one of my most anticipated parts of the trip – Portland!!    

Our tent on the Hoh riverfront