Our second camping trip of the year was at Kalaloch (clay-lock) beach located on the Olympic peninsula and the Pacific Ocean coast. We had one night at this camp ground in 2014 on a very, very short visit to Olympic National Park and knew it needed another visit.
Scouting out our top campsite choices in advance, we logged in at 6:55 a.m. six months in advance, made sure our payment method was up to date and at 7:00 a.m. we selected our second choice campsite just before they sold out. Yes, it is that intense for campsite reservations in the PNW. But I am sure the summer of 2020 where no camping was allowed, and now a summer where camping was again permitted, but living in a global pandemic probably didn't help with the pent up demand.
This time around we had three nights of camping. The first real test of camping in the PNW as Ted would say. Primarily because there are no towns within 60+ miles and no restaurants to pop in to like we had in Joseph, Oregon. So all meals would be prepared at the campsite, no shower facilities, and no wood based campfires because of drought and the threat of wildfires.
Arriving at our campsite around 5:00pm we quickly set up camp and headed down to the beach. On our walk to the beach strolling through the grounds we quickly identified that we are still amateur's when it comes to camping. A lot of pop up tents, tarps strung up between sites for additional campsite privacy and propane based campfires.
Friday we headed to the Hoh Rain Forest to hike the Hoh River Trail to Five Island. Though this was our third time to Olympic National Park, this was our first time visiting the rain forest!
On our way back to our campsite, we stopped at Ruby beach. A popular tourist destination, we stopped here years ago but were fogged in and the tide was definitely in during that visit. This time the tide was out and we were able to take a stroll the beach and watch the waves rush in and out of the tide pools. It's very mesmerizing to watch!
On Saturday we decided to check out Lake Quinault Lodge and the Quinault Rain Forest region. Hiking Irely Lake (which is not a lake this time of the year), Fletcher Canyon (which was just that, and nothing to write about), and the North Fork River Trail, where we did just that... forged a river. Yep, we put on our Chaco's and walked to the other side of the river. They say one of the largest Western Hemlocks is located on the other side, but our objective was to try a new hiking experience so that was our challenge, getting to and from the other side. Most of the water was ankle to mid calf deep, but with slower moving water comes a lot of slippery rocks. Purveying the river we decided to cross up stream from where we just saw another group cross. Was their choice to cross better than ours? Hard to tell, but that was part of the fun. We made it across with no water casualties! We may have picked a deeper part of the river with some fast(ish) moving water and we were thankfully we picked up walking sticks to help us navigate and stabilize our steps because the water rose just above my knees. The notes for this trail highly suggest having poles and lot of people find sturdy fallen branches for this and leave them along the river bank. Though the walk across was filled with anxiety it was a little fun as well! Once one the other side we walked around a bit and then started to purvey how we were going to get back! Ted thought the slower water looked better, but as we walked along the bank of the river it looked pretty deep and you could not see the bottom. I said thank you, but no thank you to that endevour. Moving back up stream we met up with another group facing the same situation. They looked much more experience than we did, but they were taking their sweet time swapping out their boots for their sandals, so we decided to cross up from our initial crossing. I think that was a mistake. It seemed a little deeper and perhaps a little faster... But we made it with no one failing over. The other group went in below our initial crossing and they probably made the right choice. Oh well. There was a little island from the faster/deeper water that allowed us to gather ourselves before we needed to cross a slower ankle deep stream before reaching the shore. Remember when I said this is where the slippery rocks were? Of course, thinking the hard part was behind me, and three steps in I fell. Curse words and curse words. It wasn't deep, it wasn't fast, but when your ankle bone hits a rock and your hand jams up against a rock to break your fall it hurts like hell. My wrist hurt pretty bad, but that's about it. Thankfully a story to tell and a lesson learned.
Until next time, Pack it in and Pack it out.
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