Leaving Port Angeles

The last day consisted of packing up, saying bye to "Mama Cat" and her babies and making the drive to the airport.  To make the trip shorter we took the ferry again to Seattle, the drive there would have been significantly longer without the ferry.  From the ferry for the first time we finally saw Mount Rainier, it occurred to me that I probably thought it was a cloud before:

Can you see Rainier?

When we hit mainland we realized we had some time to spare before check-in.  We decided to make the drive to Redmond to check out Microsoft!  It's a huge campus with their own shuttle buses and tons of apartment buildings across the street.  

On our drive back towards Seattle to get to the airport on time for our red eye back to Boston, we laughed the whole way because Rainier was right there!  

Also on the drive we saw the REI headquarters and...lots of traffic.  We probably shouldn't have pushed our drive to rush hour!  We still made it to the airport on time and saw the most beautiful sunset while they were preparing our flight.  

We had a fabulous trip and I hope you enjoyed this tour of Olympic National Park and its surrounding areas! Thanks for reading!

Touching the Pacific

Being my first time on the Pacific Coast, of course I had it on my agenda to "touch" the Pacific ocean.  From Port Angeles we made the drive up the coast to Forks, WA - no I'm not a Twilight fan.  I actually never knew the novels took place there until I was there.  Locals kept asking us, "are you here for the vampire book?"  What? I thought to myself.  We happened to be there on the weekend of the "Twilight high school dance" - a dance for fans at the actual high school.  We saw shuttle bus after shuttle bus and tons of sign-age, including one that said "Vampires Welcome."  I still haven't read any of the books or watched the movies.

One of my favorite things about Washington state was all their little coffee "huts."  They don't have Dunkin Donuts every few miles like we do, in fact they just have little coffee shacks with private owners and cute drive thrus.  I loved Tully's coffee and had the best bagels I've ever had - they were monster sized.  Enough for breakfast and lunch.  Oh - and their cups are totally compost able.

Here is a picture of Crescent Lake again on the way to Forks:

Forks, WA not only is the home of Twilight but is also the logging capital of the WORLD.  Really, the world.  

So finally, here is the Pacific ocean!

Scary thought!

So on our last night in Washington we went out to eat and try...dungeness crab!  I had an Alaskan Amber beer with my dinner, I love trying brews from different places.  At another restaurant I had tried a local porter that was delicious.  I wish I could remember what kind it was!  When we were at dinner we listened to the radio for the first time and found out that both Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett passed away.  Crazy things happen when you don't listen to the news for days!

Our last day there we spent time in our campground saying bye to Mama Cat and her kittens.  She had made a home for them underneath our cabin and we became friends.

She was really cute and her babies were too!  There were three little black kittens but 

they were very camera shy.  No kitties like flash very much!

In town we went to the Port Angeles Aquarium.  The girl working there was very knowledgeable, especially on the differences of species in the Pacific versus the Atlantic.  Here are some awesome sea stars there:

Olympic Game Farm

If you ever get the opportunity to go to Washington, you should check out the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim, WA.  Here is their site: http://www.olygamefarm.com/ .  For 28 years they had a contact with Walt Disney studios filming the animals on their farm.  They have every kind of lion, tiger and bear you could imagine!  They even have Zebra, elk, bison, cougars, prairie dogs, etc.  The animals are all tame having worked in movies.  You can drive through the "safari" trail all around the farm and feed the animals bread.  Just don't get out of your car!  With the windows down you're free to take pictures and hand feed most of the animals.  Just don't stop near the bison!  We did and ended up with its head completely in the car!!

 I think he's smiling at me?!

 The elk were still shedding their winter fur in June!

 This is a European Fallow Deer, they were very cute and very friendly!

So much drool!  

I hope the pictures show what an amazing and fun place this was to visit!

San Juan Island National Historic Park

We decided to go sea kayaking for the day out of Anacortes.  To get there we took a ferry from Port Townsend to Whidbey Island.  We drove through Ebey's Landing National Historic Preserver and through Deception  Pass State Park, both beautiful places.  Once there we kayaked around the San Juan islands and saw lots of seals.  They like to pop up and take a peek at people but didn't like us looking at them...they are very camera shy!  

Here is the ferry with Olympic NP in the background!

Party deck much?  

Apparently this is Tom Selleck's home.  He will forever be Richard from Friends to me.

Olympic NP Crescent Lake and Sol Duc Springs

On our second day we decided to hike around Crescent Lake, 

a gorgeous glacially formed lake with aqua blue water. 

The lake is as deep as 624 feet and is known for its amazing blue color and clarity 

because of a lack of nitrogen in the water which prohibits algae growth.

During our hike we stumbled upon some fresh bear poo that gave me quite a scare!  

We moved on quickly after to Sol Duc Falls and Sol Duc Hot Springs, a resort build by the National Park Service in 1912.  The waterfall is unique because it has three different falls.

 The river then passes through the Hot Springs Resort, a place with pools fed by the river with natural minerals said to have healing powers!  Many people with chronic illnesses frequent this spot.  People can purchase monthly passes to just swim in the pools.

Olympic National Park, Washington

In June 2009, my Godmother and I traveled to Olympic National Park together.  This is where and when I caught the NP bug!  All of it was a new experience to me.  The flight itself was the longest flight I had ever been on.  On top of the flight it was the first time I ever experienced jet lag!  The airport in Seattle is beautiful I must say, of course most airports are compared to Logan.  Our first night there we stayed at the Marriott hotel near the airport because we landed so late.  We slept in the next day, read the Seattle Times and relaxed in the hot tub, we had quite a ride ahead of us to Port Angeles!
On our way to Port Angeles we stopped at a grocery store and stocked up, we had no idea what to expect.  We thought Port Angeles was going to be a rural area without any stores - and we were camping out.  Our luggage was super heavy, full of portable stoves and cooking utensils, sleeping bags, hiking boots - everything you would expect. We spent well over an hour shopping and planning out our meals, unnecessarily!
Port Angeles - not very rural at all!  Lots of grocery stores; stores with spectacular mountain views, tons of restaurants, and even our campground had...a hot tub!

Here is the view from the grocery store!

We spent our first day there settling into our campsite and exploring town.  Port Angeles is a beautiful town with many seafood restaurants, a nice seaside harbor - the gateway to Victoria, Canada.  The Washington coast line is known for its rocky coast (larger scale than Maine of course), its evergreen trees, rocky beaches and its delicious crab!  Their coffee isn't so bad either!  Here is Hollywood Beach in Port Angeles:

Beach logs are a common danger on most beaches on the Washington coast.  Logs that have fallen or have been cut down by loggers end up in the rivers and eventually jam up where the ocean and rivers meet.  The tides take the logs out and then eventually they come violently back to the shores.

Our first full day we decided of course to get into Olympic NP!  Everyone told us the place to start is to drive up to the Hurricane Ridge visitors center.  The drive up was spectacular and steep!  We drove through tunnels built into mountainsides:

The mountains grew larger and the drop offs grew steeper!  Tree line began to disappear!  Recently, in Colorado actually, John and I learned exactly what the definition of tree line really is.  Growing up on the east coast, we thought tree line just had to do with height, however our mountains are much, much smaller than in the rest of the country!  Trees typically stop growing because of cold temperatures, air pressure or because of lack of moisture and oxygen levels.

The trees are growing scarce right about where we are standing!  This was at about 5,000 feet.

In June there was still snow left at the top!