Where do I start!
We (my friend Nicola is with me for the rest of my trip) had a great ferry ride from Seattle to Bainbridge Island where we started our journey on Monday. The ferries are fantastic! The service is flawless and carries up to 2,499 passengers – a rather precise number I thought. I also met a lovely fellow rider called Chris on the ferry.
Our first stop was Port Townsend. What a great little city! I haven’t had the opportunity to look into the background of the city as yet but it has a great vibe about it. The buildings are beautiful and the town is filled with art galleries. I instantly loved it! Hopefully you’ll see why.
From there we passed through Port Angeles. Part of this was because Nicola is a huge Twilight fan and wanted to see a restaurant there that features in one of the films, and we needed to get some Gluten free food for her. The Twilight tour continued on Wednesday when we arrived in Forks, which is where the book is set. I know very little about Twilight but enjoyed watching Nicola being in her element. I couldn’t resist the following photo though. It is after all about vampires and werewolves!
We spent two nights in Olympic National Forest and then two nights in Mt Rainier National Park, both of which have no mobile/cell reception or wifi. Fortunately the quality of my company and the beauty of both parks make up for this in abundance!
Olympic National Forest receives an average of 69 inches of rain every year. It is lush and stunning! It was pretty nippy in the evenings and early mornings but very pleasant during the day, which was great for our hike on Tuesday. Luckily it didn’t rain while we were there.
Our cabin was located about 20m behind a stream which was a wonderful setting, particularly as we sat with a glass of wine on the swing chair watching the sun start to set.
I’ve included a few photos below from the park, including a photo capturing my first time driving on the ‘right’ side of the road.
About an hour south of the park Highway 101 runs along the coast for a stretch. We stopped off at Ruby Beach. There was something really beautiful and mysterious about the beach which was covered in fog.
Having had no internet access for days we stopped off in Aberdeen (there as so many Scottish names around here) for two hours. This was enough time to allow Nicola to send some overdue emails, and for me to post photos and let my family know my whereabouts, although I noticed today one didn’t send. Sorry guys!
Our stop meant that we arrived at Mt Rainier National Park in the dark. Of course it didn’t help that Nicola and I got separated on the motorway and I had to direct her back to where I was waiting for her. I was very happy at that point that we both had U.S. SIM cards. At least it gave us something to chuckle about on our hike the next day.
The advantage of arriving at Mt Rainer at night was that we got to see the stars in all their glory. I have never seen anything like it. We had a perfect view of the Milky Way. I cannot take a photo of the stars from my iPhone but you could look at some photos online. We saw three shootings stars in less than ten minutes. Another item ticked off my bucket list. Woohoo!!
Mt Rainier is absolutely stunning! Although the the mountain has not erupted in 1,100 years it is still considered an active volcano. Standing just over 14,000 ft it is impressive, particularly as it is covered in glaciers.
We were told that we were extremely lucky having been on the mountain with near perfect weather. It apparently rains here a lot too but we had perfect skies. Our second blessing was that the vegetation id starting to turn so we had an array of green, yellow, orange, red and purple covering the side of the mountain. It is indescribably beautiful.
I have included some photos below.
It took Nicola and I about 2.5 hours to walk about a third of the Skyline Trail which starts from Paradise Inn where we were staying. It is graded as a strenuous hike so we took it really easy, stopping many times for photo opportunities and tying to give Nicola chance to adjust to the elevation change.
When we arrived at the top we decided to take separate routes down. Nicola headed back the way we came and I decided to take the long way around and give my legs a good stretch. I was so excited being on the trail that I starting jogging. I didn’t stop until I nearly reached the end. It was amazing running down the mountain, but given that I almost never run these days, it explains why I’m walking like John Wayne today. It was so worth it though!
Walking down the hill to where Trinity was parked this morning, and looking at Mt Rainier, I realised that I really going to struggle to leave her in San Francisco. It’s going to be a long 7 weeks before we are reunited. I’ll be counting the days!
Mel & Trinity 