Olympic National Park

July 19, 2011

We arrived in Port Angeles, WA Sunday afternoon ready to check out Olympic National Park. On Monday, we drove up Hurricane Ridge...another narrow, winding road!! No guardrails in many places! Unfortunately, the clouds were hanging around the top of the mountain, so we did not see the spectacular view we were hoping to see. The clouds have not cooperated with us at all, so we have not seen many of the tall snow covered peaks.

Today we drove to the Hoh Rain Forest and had a wonderful time. This rain forest is a temperate rain forest that gets about 12 feet of rain a year. The Sitka Spruce and Western Hemlock dominate the forest, with some Douglas Fir as well. They average 200-300 feet tall, and are just magnificent. They live at least 300 years, and have many different kinds of moss growing on them and hanging from their branches. What a peaceful place. We were hoping to see elk while we were there, but they didn't show up for us.

We have seen many other beautiful places here on the Olympic Peninsula, and will never forget these experiences. Tomorrow we will leave here for Mount Ranier.



View from our back yard while camping at the KOA in Port Angeles, WA.





Ranger Sharah talking with us about the habitat living on Hurricane Ridge. As you can see, we were in the clouds....so not awesome views for us.





From one tunnel to another on Hurricane Ridge Rd.






Taken from a beach at Lake Crescent just outside the park.





We could not believe how tall and straight these trees were in the rain forest.




A few of the moss covered trees in the rain forest







Sorry.....hit the wrong picture by mistake...this is a photo from Yellowstone





Ethan found another hugging tree!





Another slip of the finger....these are some of the cedars in Glacier!




This Sitka Spruce is 270 feet tall and estimated to be 500-550 years old! It's diameter is 12 and a half feet.....wonder what the circumference would be?

Location:Washington