I woke up in my car, washed up, brushed teeth and heading out. I actually slept until 10am in my car. One of the better nights of sleep in a while. I need to do this more often. My first stop was the Dungeness Spit, and extension of land home to various wildlife.
I got onto the famed 101 at its start and was to follow this all the way down the coast of California. My next stop was Olympia National Park. I pulled into Hurricane Ridge for a hike, but found the trail and road closed due to snow
Download OLYMPIC National Park PDF
I continued west along 101
My next stop was Forks, made famous by the Twilights saga books. I was now on the Pacific coast, stopping at an area called La Push, and more specifically second beach, which can be found on the left side of the above PDF.
This scene was straight out of the Goonies. Lots of large monoliths among the crashing waves. Huge trees washed upon the shore. It was pouring and also reminded me of the closing scene of Point Break where Patrick Swayze rides out to his ultimate demise among the pounding waves of a beach on Australia or New Zealand…I cant remember.
I headed back towards 101 and back into Olympia National Park towards the Hoh river Valley/Rain Forest. Still pouring rain, I got out for a short hike in Moss covered trees, but was unable to do the lengthy river hike.
At the visitor station I picked up one of those national park books that have a place for you to stamp each time you visit a park. It was a little late in the game as I was not going to revisit all the ones I already hit. I asked the lady if I could mail it to the parks and have them stamp and send back. She was not to optimistic. I think I will try it and that can become a blog itself.
I worked back to 101 and headed down the coast stopping at a few trails along the way
I crossed the border into Oregon and found a Hostel in the historic town of Astoria.
It is actually started as a trading post for John Jacob Astor’s company. It turns out to be the oldest settlement west of the Mississippi. He hostel was called the Norblad and it looked like it was an old Psych hospital
I could not argue with the $40/night and cleaned up before hitting a couple breweries in town:
A great little fishing town along the coast that would be a great stop on the tour of Oregon’s Beer, which is what it, seems this trip is turning into.
Until Tomorrow
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Darren
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