The Munchkin's Notebook

Today we end our Olympic National Park vacation, because tomorrow we fly home. We checked out of Quinault lodge around 9:30 AM, after eating our last “Logger’s Breakfast” on the lodge deck, and then started our drive back to Seattle with a slight detour to Staircase Ranger Station.   Staircase was kind of on way and only added two hours to our journey due to the up and back nature of the drive.   We got to Staircase around 11:30 AM got out of the car walked around briefly then head back down the road stopping to view a few waterfalls.   Once we got to the bottom of mountain, out of the park, and into the very tiny park gateway town it was a bit after noon so, we stopped at the “Burgers, Teriyaki, and Ice Cream Shack” for lunch.     Lunch was surprisingly good, Jim got the bulgogi burger and I got teriyaki chicken, it was nice to have something different for lunch then the basic food around Quinault.   After lunch we continued our drive into Seattle, to chec...

View of Beach 4 Today we go up around 7:00 AM to a misty rain that was off and on most of the morning. We had breakfast in the rain at a table on the lodge deck, which had an umbrella covering it. After breakfast we walked along the lake up to the .5-mile rainforest interpretive loop trail and then continued along the longer trail that connects back to the lodge.   The whole hike took us about 2 hours, so we had lunch at the lodge on our balcony.   After lunch we traveled up 101 to Beach 4 to look at the tide pools there. According to several internet articles Beach 4 has several good tide pools.   The tide pools had several green anomies, no starfish. I thought the tide pools at Rialto beach were better.   Overall, it was a very uneventful day.   Tomorrow we head back towards Seattle to so we can catch our flight home the following day.

Today we slept in till 6:30 AM, I know we really slept in a lot, but still made it to breakfast.   Today we tried the pancakes.   The pancakes were not anything special, just normal pancakes; however, Jim noted we are very close to Canada but can’t be supplied with real maple syrup.   After breakfast we headed up the South Shore Road to a couple of waterfalls, so I could take some pictures of the them using my tripod so I could get that nice fluffy water.    The first one was a short .3-mile hike to a bridge overlooking the falls.   Sadly, this bridge was in the wrong spot, because the larger falls was further down the stream and you could not get a good view of it.   So, I had to settle for the smaller falls.   I took a couple of pictures of it from the bridge, then climbed down to the water level to get a better picture of it.   After taking some pictures at streambed level we climbed back up to the trail and headed back to the car to move ...

View from Hurricane Ridge Today we got up at a bit before 6:00 AM to start our journey out to Hurricane Ridge.  It takes three hours to drive from Hurricane Ridge from Quinault, so we wanted to make sure we got an early start.  Leaving at 6:30 AM resulted in us skipping the lodge breakfast, they start serving at 7:30 AM, and pulling off at Ruby Beach to eat a breakfast MRE.  The breakfast MRE was hash browns and bacon with a toaster pastry, crackers, apple sauce, and jam.  After our breakfast we continued up 101 to Hurricane Ridge which took us past Crescent Lake to Port Angles the into the national park.   This particular entrance to Olympic NP does it right, by having a small parking area for people to pull off into, so they can then get out of their cars to take a picture in front of the national park sign.  Then right after that small parking lot is the entrance to the first visitor center.  The visitor centers are only partially open, in ...

Today we got up around 6:00AM and had breakfast at the lodge.   We split the logger breakfast which includes three eggs, two strips of bacon, potato cubes, and a biscuit with jelly.   It is a good size for us to split and not be hungry afterwards.    After we finished breakfast, we got in the car to drive up South Shore Road to the Pony Bridge and Enchanted Valley trail head.    On the way out we stopped to see the Big Sitka Tree, which is large in diameter while also very tall. After viewing the Sitka Tree, we continued along South Shore Road stopping at Merriman Falls and then at Bunch Falls.   It should be noted that 10 miles of the drive was on a very curvy single lane gravel road, which the Chrysler 300 handled reasonably well.   The hike to Pony Bridge is considered a moderate 2.5-mile hike (one-way) with an elevation change of about 700ft.   We decided we were not going to do the full 13-miles (one-way) out to Enchanted Valley. ...

Rialto Beach Sea Stacks Today we got up around 6:00 AM and took our time getting ready and had breakfast at the lodge.   After breakfast we made the 2 hour drive up to Rialto Beach, to see the sea stacks and a feature called the “hole in the wall”.   The drive up to Rialto was not exciting, but it did require a drive through the town of Forks.   This is the same town that the “Twilight” books and movies were set. In the town there is a store dedicated to Twilight. Rialto beach is a mix of sand and rocks, the upper portion of the beach was rocky while closer to the water was sandy.   The day was very cloudy, and the beach had a decent sea mist blowing across it which made the beach feel kind of moody.   The walk out to the “hole in the wall” can only be accomplished during low tide and about two miles long (one way) on a relatively flat beach. We got there at 10:30 with max low tide at noon, so we had plenty of time to walk the wall and back.   Along the wal...

Early morning overlooking the lake After a good night sleep, we woke up around 5:00AM PST, but the lodge doesn’t start serving breakfast till 7:30 AM PST so we went for an early morning hike near the lodge.  Our first hike was 1.6 miles in the wood across from the lodge. It started out flat then started a climb upward, we heard a couple waterfall along the path but there were not good viewing locations along the trail to get pictures of the falls. The whole hike took us about hour and half to complete.  After splitting breakfast, which was eggs, bacon, potatoes, and a biscuit, we did a second hike.  The second hike was 3.5 miles long.  This hike took us along lake Quinault, over to the Rain Forest Loop, through the Cedar Bog, and back down to the lodge. This was an up and down trail with a few even spots. These trails are not for those who cannot handle hills and are considered a moderate level hikes.    We started the trail around 8:00AM and got back ...