Great Place, But Please Stop The Foghorn

Hey everyone! Gavin here, and today I'm going to be talking about our week and a half stay at Newport, Oregon. The day we left Elwha, we stopped at a campground for the night. Turns out, someone had taken our site. Yeah. So, we just pulled into the next available site and stayed there.

 The next day, we left for Newport. Once we got there, we just set up, walked Bernie around, and went to bed. The day after that, we walked Bernie on the Cooper's Ridge Nature Trail that ran around the campground. Afterward, we went to the beach there and walked down it. The water is FREEZING. Like, colder than Maine. If you've ever swam in Maine, you know what I'm talking about. Brrr. To get to the beach, you have two options. Walk down the nice, paved, informational-sign-having trail, OR walk across sand dunes. Obviously, we walked the sand dunes. It was fun, but it is really hard to climb them. One wrong step and you fall a foot through the sand dune.

 The next day, we walked on the jetty with Dad and Bernie. There were actually two jetties but we walked on the one next to the campground. On the way there, we walked on some sand dunes. We actually slid down them a couple of times. Bernie was happy that he got to go for a walk. They were super long walls of rock that made a "driveway" for boats. At the end of the closest one, there was a foghorn. It went 24/7 and was SUPER ANNOYING. Eventually we learned to ignore it but it was really annoying.

 The next day it rained, so we just stayed home and did nothing most of the day. For dinner we went to a place called Georgie's. It was delicious. The next two days we just did school.

 The day after that, we met up with some friends that we had met in Elwha. We had dinner with them and that was fun. We saw sea lions on the rocks afterward. (Although, after dinner, I unfortunately got a splitting headache. I ended up going to bed at 8:30.) 

The next day, we did school and Mom and I walked in the rain. I also made Tomato Bacon Basil soup. It was amazing! Thank you Lisa from the Charlton General Store!

Pretty much the most amazing soup ever.

The day after that, we had breakfast at Georgie's. The food was so good the first time, we figured we should go again. Later that day, we went to the Newport Aquarium. It was awesome!! We saw sea otters for the first time!!!! I swear they look like Pumpkin.... Is Pumpkin part sea otter?? Bella says he is part cat, part squirrel, part raccoon, AND part sea otter. Not sure about that. 

Afterward, we walked down to a place called Devil's Churn. It was a ravine where the ocean churned. Hence the name. Also, the water was yellow. Ew. 

After that, we went to an ice cream place called Toppe's Ice Cream. See Bella's post for more info.

The next day, we left for our next adventure! I'll tell you about that next time!



Signing off,
         Gavin

Sea Stars at Sunset

Rialto Beach, Washington

September 4, 2017

I'm devoting one post totally to Rialto Beach on the coast of Washington. It may be one of my favorite places that we have ever visited (thanks to cousin Kathy for the recommendation!) We wanted to go at low tide so that we could search for critters in the tidepools and walk down the beach to the Hole in the Wall rock formation. Luckily, low tide coincided with the sunset on the day that we visited, making the views all the more incredible. We were in awe of the scenery and loved checking out the sea stars, anemones, crabs, limpets, and barnacles in the tidepools. We also got a glimpse of a harbor seal playing in the waves. Our dinner time was a picnic on a piece of driftwood while we watched the sun sinking. An awesome evening!

Finally hitting the west coast!

August 26 - September 13
Port Angeles, Washington

Olympic National Park

We spent most of our first week on the Olympic Peninsula exploring different areas of the Olympic National Park. It was fabulous to be in a less-crowded park, though some of the trails were pretty busy. We at least felt like we had a little elbow room and really enjoyed checking out all of the diverse landscapes.

Hoh Rain Forest

We took advantage of one of Don's days off to trek over to the rainforest on the western side of the park. It was almost a two-hour drive, but totally worth it. The Hoh is one of the only temperate rain forests in the U.S. and is very lush, green, and mossy. Unfortunately, there had been such a dry spell in the area that even the moss was dried out. I've been told that the ground is usually at least damp and the trees and moss drip with moisture, but that wasn't at all the case when we visited. Still beautiful, though! It was hot and humid enough for Gavin to get a tad bit overheated, but he pushed through and we did a couple of the trails and had a picnic lunch.

The two people who are afraid of heights doing a log crossing!

Elwha River Valley

We tried to explore the areas closest to our campground in the evenings when Don finished with work. This section of the park was right down the road from where we were staying.

We first did a short little trail to Madison Falls. It was a short walk, but the kids really liked it because we could get right down to the water.

A cool tree stump - I liked the way it looked, so you get to see it :-) 

Next was a drive into the park. We took the unpaved Whiskey Bend Road that climbed up and gave us some gorgeous views. We went out to the Giles Canyon Viewpoint, where a dam was removed a few years ago and the vegetation is beginning to grow back in.

After driving around until the sun was setting, we headed back out to the main road. We had another fun bridge experience and all had to suck it in to fit the truck across.

Lake Crescent

One of my favorite evenings was spent in the Lake Crescent area. We started by taking a trail to Marymere Falls. The kids always like for a hiking trail to have a payoff at the end, so a lot of the time we choose hikes that head to waterfalls. The path goes through an otherworldly old growth forest, then climbs a bajillion natural, carved, and wooden steps to the level of the top of the waterfall.

The beginning of the trail passes through a tunnel underneath the roadway.

This part of the forest seemed like a movie set! I almost expected an Ewok to come swinging through.

Awesome footbridge!

There was also an interpretative trail in the area that we explored. These types of hikes aren't challenging, but usually provide a lot of information about what we are seeing and help us to learn about each new area. We enjoyed the "Moments in Time" trail that took us through old growth forest and around the lake.

We capped off the night with a picnic dinner on the shore of Crescent Lake. The glacial water was so cold that even Gabriella wasn't tempted to get in. It sure was pretty, though.