Day Two in the Rain Forest

MAKING MEMORIES: JOY COMES UP AS RAIN COMES DOWN

Welcome to Wild & Wonderful Washington State! I don’t think I found anything more wild & wonderful than Olympic National Park in the state. We drove a lot on this day, but everything we saw was amazing!

A Quiet Morning

I was awake before 6, crept around our dark hotel room and eased out into the hall. As soon as I did, I realized I’d left my phone and my keys inside the room, but no way I was waking up Bill. I figured once I got to the lobby there would be a clock. All lobbies have clocks, right? Wrong!

They did have a gym, but it was not exactly state of the art, so I decided to take advantage of the cozy lobby. I curled up on the big sofa, but no fire had been lit yet. There was also no clock. I had to check with the desk clerk in another room when I wondered what time it was.

It was a peaceful time. I wrote in my travel journal, read some and did a few crossword puzzles. The clerk had told me the Roosevelt Dining Room opened at 7:30, so that would be my signal to go upstairs and start getting ready. The desk clerk did give me a key to get back in, but I had to answer a bunch of security questions, so they were being safe.

Hitting the Road

Breakfast was hit & miss. I’m sure Bill got coffee somewhere, but it wasn’t the Roosevelt Dining Room. We did stop by an internet cafe that I had hoped would have breakfast, but what they had we didn’t want. We ate some of the snacks I’d brought with me and started up the road.

We didn’t know exactly what we were doing, but that was OK, because everything was gorgeous. There would be signs telling us of scenic overlooks. Sometimes we’d stop sometimes we didn’t. One we stopped at educated us on log jams. Another was named Ruby Beach and apparently it was red when the sun shone on it, but there was no sun.

We found the road which led to the Hoh Rainforest, which was just a named rain forest in the forest of rain we were in. That’s when we found a cafe and had what I guess was brunch. The gluten free factor was an issue and I don’t think either one of of loved what we got, but it was sustenance and we were soon on our way again.

Hoh Rainforest Visitors Center

Having only one day in the rainforest was a point of frustration for me. I think I could have spent my whole two weeks going to every stop along the Pacific edge of Olympic National Park, but after a few stops I could tell that Mr. Bill didn’t like all the starting and stopping and seeing the same sort of thing. That’s why I pointed us towards the Visitor’s Center. Only it was down at the end of a road of which we’d just have to turn around and go back on to get to where we needed to go.

If you’re an off roader or a hiker, then this terrain was made for you. You’d drive your 4-Wheeler up to the Visitors Center and then head off on any of the trails it served as a trail head for – but us tourists just had to drive forever to get there and then drive back to where we’d come from. Don’t get me wrong, it’s worth visiting, it’s just inconvenient for the less hearty visitor, like me.

Contrarily, the sun which refused to peek out during our stop at Ruby Beach came out in all its glory as we drove along the Hoh Rainforest Road. The landscape looked a lot like the monotonous scenery we’d seen on the day before on our way to the rainforest. I drove, Bill napped – both ways.

The Hoh Rainforest Visitor’s Center itself was undergoing renovation. Thankfully, there were restrooms. There were also two nature trails. We did both and we loved them. One short path is handicap friendly. It’s the shorter of the two and pretty crowded, but don’t expect much wonder. The other path leads up, down and around through beautiful stretches of rainforest. We loved that part and took our time.

We lingered as long as we could, but we still had a lot of road ahead of us. We needed to be at Port Angeles by the end of the day. I put the pedal to the metal while Bill snoozed.

We made lots of photos throughout the day, but I’ll confess, once I got home it was hard to ascertain which ones went with which stops, so I just made a few photo book spread of it all. Here they are. Enjoy them and then be sure and come back next week and visit our next stops with us.