Author: tp

Did I mention that I hiked 11 miles yesterday?!

I arose at 6:30am again today and hustled to get out of camp. I was on the road by 8:30. I realized that I had time to get out to the Pacific coast today as well, as it was only 12 miles to the south! Though I was worried about having enough gas, I made it out to Ruby Beach. The parking area is situated in a stand of towering spruce trees. the ocean is audible and visible through the trees. There is a short, steep path leading down to the beach. After crossing over a pile of bleached driftwood at the end of the path, I finally arrive on the beach. In front of me, the Pacific Ocean churns and crashes against grey sand and smoothly polished round stones. Behind me, cliffs reach upwards, and tall spruce tower from their tops. Between the two are the bleached trees that have fallen from the cliffs and become smoothly polished driftwood. It was another stunning sight and I started taking photos. Close to shore were towering outcroppings that had been eroded from the underlying rock. Further out to the south-west I could see Destruction Island, the home of a major lighthouse that at one time housed a magnificent fresnel lens, though as the name implies, it lost as many ships as it eventually saved.

From the beach, I turned northwards towards Forks. I was unable to capture this on film, but there was a dramatic illustration of the two competing philosophies of the Park Service and the Forestry Service. The Park Service believes in preserving land in its natural state in perpetuity. Driving through the towering spruce forest on the way to the beach was a clear example of this. However, Park and Forest land leapfrog each other in this part of Washington. No sooner as I passed a billboard saying I was entering the Olympic National Forest then the forest transitioned to a clear-cut lot. The devastation was striking! The Forest Service believes active management is the best way to protect land. They allow logging, let the land recover for 30 years, and then will open up that section to logging again. I think they have a reasonable philosophy, but it still looks terrible in person.

After gassing up in Forks, I pulled in to a roadside espresso shack, a common feature in this part of the world. My latte was DELICIOUS! Not sure if that was due to having been in the woods, but I’ll believe it really was amazing. That latte also helped break up the persistent cloud cover I had been experiencing since I left the Hoh River valley. As soon as I got east of Forks and started hitting the Sol Duc River, the sun came out! Finally, I turned up the park road to Sol Duc. They were doing some major road improvements on this road, so I sat in traffic for about 10-20 minutes waiting for the one lane road to clear.

Sol Duc Hot Springs are naturally occurring hot springs in the Sol Duc River valley. There is a pretty fancy resort built up around them (and a $12 entrance fee), and the park campground is at the inflated price of $14/night (as opposed to $12 throughout the rest of the park). I finally got a lovely camp site situated amongst the towering trees, and then headed up into the mountains. Today I hiked up to Mink Lake. This secluded lake has a nice shelter and camp site. It is about 1000′ higher than the valley floor, so the resort guests don’t tend to make it up here, even though it is only 2.5 miles away. I spent about 15 minutes sitting by the lake, watching the water foul play and dive. I hiked back down to the resort, then headed along the river to Sol Duc falls. The falls were small, but fast-moving. The forest here was much more open than in the Hoh, with leafier ferns throughout. It ended up being a bigger hiking day than I had wanted, though the evening was capped by a hot shower at the resort, and a fresh change of clothes for my last day in the park! I had an earlier dinner of chicken and rice, read briefly, and went to sleep.

ps: pictures at Flickr

I woke up at Heart o’ the Hills campground at 6:30am, certainly not typical for me, but giving me plenty of time to start the day off right! I made coffee, hot granola, packed, and was back in the car by 8am. Though there were some clouds, it was fairly clear so I decided to drive to the top of Hurricane Ridge. The scenery was stunning! There was a young female deer on the precipice as I ascended, and then again as I descended! The view from the summit was breathtaking, and almost made up for not doing the hike.

But I had a new mission now. After a few photo ops, I went to town, got some soap (which I had forgotten at the Lyman’s), had an espresso (decent, not great), and headed west. It was a leisurely drive, with many stops for photos of the mountains and lakes. Even so, I arrived at the Hoh Rainforest campground around noon. By 12:30 I had a riverfront campsite and hit the trail.

I hiked out to 5-mile Island campsite. The trip through old growth Sitka Spruce, Maple, ane Pine was amazing. The trees averaged between 5′ & 8′ in diameter. Crazy! Lush ferns and mosses were everywhere. It was like hiking in the Northeast…with the plants on steroids and everything smelling better. I leapfrogged another young hiker for a bit, and a few groups heading out on longer expeditions.

The campsite at 5-mile island was great…privy, bear wire, right on the river…I should have planned to rent a car and come out here all along! This trail at its longest is 18mi to the glacial moraines of Mount Olympus, with many opportunities for shorter trips too. It also has the ability to see a diverse terrain, from the lush temperate rainforest, the mountains, alpine meadows, and the glaciers. This area definitely deserves more exploration.

It took about 2 hours to get out this far, and so it was about time to start heading back. After passing the young hiker one more time, I made it back and went to set up camp. The ground here was much better than the ground at Heart o’the Hills, though still rocky. My hands still were sore from driving in my tent stakes the night before! I put on my flip flops and headed back out to explore the nature trails surrounding the visitor center. The hall of mosses trail was gorgeous. Since I had just did a long hike, I wasn’t expecting to see anything else new. However, this short trail wove its was through more old growth trees that were covered in lacy moss. I was also interesting seeing the forest with the aid of the interpretive signs. Clearly this was built for the tourists, but I can say the Park Service did a great job and shared some great views with them. There was also a small brook running through this section that was crystal clear. Another highlight of this trail, the rotting 190 foot long tree.

I also wanted to do the spruce nature trail, but that was a little longer (1.5 mi) and I certainly wasn’t doing that in flip flops, so I headed to camp to change again, and then back to the trails. While the Hall of Mosses was up on a hill, the Spruce trail was closer to the river. The undergrowth here was more cleaned out, probably due to grazing deer and elk. I took a short video of the rushing river. There were also some great examples of “nurse logs” in this section. When a giant tree falls, it provides food for new plants and fungus. Over time, you can get a series of trees growing in a straight line, absorbing nutrients from their fallen nurse tree. Eventually, the original tree rots away and you are left with a straight line of new trees. After learning about this phenomenon, it was easy to see evidence of it everywhere!

I had headed out towards the river to try and see some elk, to no avail. As I walked back into camp, what was grazing right there but a young buck, 50 paces from the road! If I had know they came right into the campground I would have stayed there and made dinner. In any event, I made some chili mac & beef (BEST camp meal of the trip), did some reading, watched sunset and the stars by the river, and went to bed.

ps: photos at Flickr