(written October 16th from notes taken previously)
We woke up to a clearing in front of us that had been logged a bit and a clearing behind us that had been logged a little bit, and we were on this little road between the two.
Output Road in quotes because it was just a connecting Lane between the two Open clearings. It had rained during the night, and there were some pretty good puddles of water in our path backwards from where we were parked to get out. It wasn’t really realistic to turn around, so we just backed through it relatively quickly so as not get stuck in a mud hole out in the middle of nowhere.
As we were leaving, we noticed that there was a fabulous fire ring down in the lower portion of the first clearing. We could have used that as a fire pit for the night, but we were just ready to call it a night before, and we weren’t much up for building a morning fire to start the day this time.
So we headed back off the road that was off the road that was off the road that was off the road, back to the road that was off the road that was off the road, back to the road that was off the road, and back to the main road, where we headed to the Hoh Rainforest.
True to form, the whole rainforest was, in fact, rainy. 🙃
We wandered through a few miles worth of trails taking A plethora of pictures of the many different kinds of trees and tree formations and what not. I say tree formations because one of the common things in the rainforest there is trees to grow out of other trees that have fallen down. You might have a massive tree that’s fallen down 100 years ago, and then you’ll have a row of 5 or 6 large trees growing out of the remains of the old one.
I guess they call the trees that fall down, nurse trees.
Pretty cool.
Some of the nurse logs were actually stumps that were quite large, and so the trees growing out of them had to send their Roots from way up high all the way down to the ground. Super cool to see the formations of the roots, sometimes going down from the place on the tree 10 ft or more high.
It’s a thing of wonder for me just to see trees that are absolutely massive like that– trees that have lived hundreds of years. It’s sobering… awe inspiring.
The bright colors, the huge trees, the different kinds of trees, the different formations, the amazing mosses… It was just a beautiful Forest. Honestly, it wasn’t much different than some of the other places that we’ve been, except that there were trails cleared so that people could walk through the forest instead of running into the underbrush and having to climb over and under stuff everywhere.
It was a beautiful place.
We definitely got wet from all the rain, but not deep enough to soak, so that was nice.
From the Hoh Rain Forest, our next destinations were Hurricane Ridge and Deer Park, on the north side of the Olympic mountain range, so we drove back down the Hoh River Road, along the river and back to the main road and wound our way North and then to East and then up the winding road, up, up, and up to Hurricane Ridge.
Of course, we stopped several times to take pictures, and the clouds had rolled in rather thickly, so there wasn’t much in the way of a view of the breathtaking craggy peaks that can be seen on a clear day, but it was beautiful in its own way.
Hurricane Ridge gets its name because of the super strong winds at the summit. This time of year, the strong winds are combined with some pretty cold temperatures, making it a pretty chilly place to be, especially at sunset, which was when we were there. 🙃
Still, it was beautiful, and fortunately for us, we have a warm vehicle to return to.
On the way down, we stopped off again at one of the viewpoints where I had previously taken pictures. I had noticed on the way up that there was what looked like maybe a wrecked vehicle way down below the viewpoint.
It looked like the front end of a Jeep.
I had thought about going dan to check it out on our way up to the summit, but decided against it. On the way down, I was still concerned, but fortunately when we pulled off again, another gentleman pulled off as well to take pictures, and he had a real camera with a zoom of like 100. So I called him over and asked him to zoom in on what looked like the Jeep, and it did indeed look like vehicle parts, but there didn’t look like there was a complete vehicle down there, so I stopped worrying that maybe someone had gone over the edge and was trapped down there, and we went on our way.
Coming down from the mountain, neither of us were in the mood to try and make our own food for the night, so we stopped off at a Mexican restaurant in Port Angeles. Tasty food. Plenty of it, and it was nice not to have to eat the same thing that we’ve been eating nor take time to make it.
To be fair, my mom has done nearly all of the food preparation, so it wouldn’t be me having to do it anyway. 🙃
Because the weather didn’t appear to be favorable, and because it was going to be a fairly long drive all the way up to deer Park and all the way back down, meaning that we would get into Seattle a lot later than what we were hoping, we decided to skip going to deer Park and instead decided to try and get a bit closer to Seattle.
So we drove from Port Angeles around to the east side of the Olympics and then South to the crossing at The Tacoma narrows bridge, setting our sites on a Love’s truck stop shortly after getting off the bridge. The Love’s I guess was in a little suburb of Tacoma called Fife.
We weren’t the only ones sleeping there, so we crossed our fingers and hoped we would be okay, bought some gas station food, ate dinner, and went to bed.
I admit, being back in the city is… uncomfortable. 😅
Oh well. Breathe… just… breathe. 🙃
Lift the world.
~ stephen
Lift the World 