Olympic National Park - Days 63 and 64

Sunday, September 2
Olympic National Park has several different ecosystems, perhaps the most diverse of any park in the US. It has mountain terrain, glaciers, sea coast, lakes, and it is home to the only rainforest in the 48 states (Alaska and Hawaii each have one too). To be called a rainforest, there must be more than 200 inches of rain per year and the western side of the mountain range qualifies. This kind of precipitation creates some fantastic phenomenon: moss like you’ve never seen, trees that grow on top of downed trees because the forest floor is too covered to grow there, and creeks with green plants growing in the bottom. The 2.5 hour drive (one way) from our campground was worth the trip. We saw 200 foot tall trees where the base of the tree was on a tree that had fallen 100 years ago. The roots wrap around the fallen tree and when it finally rots it leaves a gap between the base of the tree and the ground. Some were so large you could crawl through the gap. If you are ever in Seattle, the rainforest is something to see, but it’s a 5 hour drive from the Seattle area. On our drive back we stopped at a lodge area to attend a ranger talk(one of the national parks with a lodge inside it for all you non-campers) . Once again, we were impressed with the ranger’s speaking skills and the facts. This talk was on birds and he had stuffed specimens for us to hold included the great horned owl and a red-tailed hawk. Two funny things happened today. As we were pulling up to the ranger check point at the rainforest there was a very long line of cars and the checkpoint was barely visible in the distance. Seth asked, "what are all the cars stopped for". I said "check-in". He said, "why are people stopping for a chicken, they have all seen that before". Then I restated that the line was for check-in not chicken, but it was worth a good laugh. The second came this evening. We picked up Bailey’s baby doll and noticed the mouth had food shoved in it. We asked Bailey if she had fed the baby doll and she stated she had fed her a banana. Then we said, "you can’t feed the baby bananas". Her reply was priceless, "I didn’t know bananas had milk in them". You see, Bailey is allergic to milk so we can’t give her anything with milk in it. Apparently, Bailey keeps the baby doll on a milk free diet also.

Saturday, September 1
After a brief morning swim at the hotel to work out some energy, we drove from Seattle to Port Angeles today – about 3 hours. Port Angeles is on the Olympic Peninsula which is very different than the city life of Seattle. Upon arrival we went to the Olympic National Park visitor center and they recommended we make the 17 mile drive up to the 5400 foot peak at Hurricane Ridge. Weather for the rest of the weekend was supposed to cloud the view. We made the drive and took a hike at the top. The views were pretty neat and we got close to a buck who didn’t seem to mind if we approached him.