Day: 5.2

Made it to Forks, WA today.  Tiny spec of a town, near the Pacific coast, next to Olympic NP. While 2 nights ago I paid way to much for a tiny room where they wanted to charge 15 bucks more just to have internet in the room, tonight I found a place that is actually an entire multiroom apartment with kitchen and internet for half the price. You just never know what you are going to get with motel/hotel/other. Though they do charge a 15 dollar extra fee if you clean/gut fish in the room.  Not much in this town, but it does have a high concept store.  It's a Grocery/SportingGoods/Hardware store all in one.  You can buy PVC pipe 100 feet from the Milk, and 100 more feet to pick up ammo. And you can check it all out at the same register.  This store has the basics of civilization figured out.

After the previous post, I hit the road to Tacoma Washington, town doesn't resemble the truck at all! I decided to take the long route around the southern side of Olympic to see more. It also gave me a great view of the coast at times. And it is a very nice coast.  I don't like the beach, but this isn't beach, it's coast. So mostly rock, driftwood, trees. But also gave me points to go into Olympic, there are narrow dirt roads into the park where you can go into the Rain Forest bits.

So this area so far has been very impressive. Back to Giant Forest again. The down side is this is logging country.  Plot after Plot of clear cuts, replants and so forth.  One moment you have massive Doug Fir, the next a tangle of stumps.

I went down the first road into the park. It's pretty hard to get a good image of what it looks like.  These woods are just so thick, and it's not all Fir, it can be hardwoods too. Here is a path off the hardtop back into who knows where.

Not long after this, I was returning out to the highway. I saw a bear in the road, it got in the woods before I could get a shot. When I rolled up, it and what looks like its cub(s) where just maybe 20 feet in, but I could barely see them. It's just so thick. And this was in a thin area do to a bit of a marsh.  I don't know how one could hunt here, your bullet would make it 30-40 feet at best before hitting a tree. And you would have to be right on top of something to see it.

There is at least one Bear in this shot.

I headed down the road to the next road in. Basically there are thin access road strips to the NP, with private or "native" american land on either side. Can you spot which is National Park and which is Tribe Land?

Here, how about now?

The National Park is the one with slightly taller trees.

This is just looking in from the transition.  One moment waste land, next you are just in a wall of green and daytime goes away. It doesn't take long before it's more than clear you aren't in they typical woods out back. You don't worry about hitting sasquatch anymore, you worry about a brontosaurus grazing for lunch being around the next bend.

But then there is the sadness of this area. With big forest comes big axes. If it hasn't been protected, it has been logged. Now, I'm not going to be a hypocrite and say this needs to be stopped. We need wood, it has to come from someplace. But as the signs along the road show, you can cut, replant, re-cut. But....we don't need to go into National Forest, National Parks, or any other forest that have been un-touched. We have the land needed for lumber. But when using it, don't waste lumber. At the other end of every 2x4 is this.

Yes, it looks dark there because of what I did (was shooting into sunset, so much of that is exposure, not dramatic effect). But it is a wasteland as far as the eye can see, with just a few lone trees left (why?). Very sad site.  And it's right against the National Park.  One side goes for money today, the other goes for our kids tomorrow.

It was then time to move up the road.  Seeing huge forest, then clear cut gets depressing fast. Sunset was mainly while I took shots of the clear cut.  Then fog rolled in, so that was the end of sunset. There is some beach access, I ran through the trees just as the sun went away, just in the steps from the truck to the overlook through a clump of woods it was gone.  I have not had good sunset timing this trip.

Tomorrow I will explore more of Olympic, then take a ferry to Seattle.  I think I will be very bummed about not having more time here. I think this is a park I will really like.  Forest you really just want to walk out through.  While Rainier was impressive, I think it would end up just like Yosemite, it's impressive at first, but after a few trips it becomes dull because it's the same thing all the time. Walls of rock, with pine trees and dry brush/grass.  Year round and year after year it doesn't change much. Olympic has the big Firs (which are better looking trees than a redwood or sequoia, just smaller), but also has hardwoods. So leaves change.

Almost to Canada, and then I can start heading east.  Driven ~1800 miles.  Still looking at the Pacific Ocean.