Day 69 (July 24) – Hoh Rain Forest

Leaving Hurricane Ridge area of Olympic.  We had and traveled 101 all the way up the Oregon Coast and now are traveling 101 all the way around Olympic NP.  It is still a beautiful drive.  Today we drove along Crescent Lake, which just goes on and on.  I wish I would have timed how long it took us to get past it.  It is huge.  It took us about 2 ½ hours to get from HR to Hoh.

Our campground was right around the corner from the VC, but we didn’t know, so we unhitched and drove.  We checked to see about ranger programs as the girls needed to attend one for their Jr. Ranger badge, but we had missed the morning one and the next one was at 8:00 PM.  The ranger on duty, however, wanted to give them a private session and led us out to a little bridge over a creek.  He had them squat down and he started killing flies.  Then he dropped them into the water and we watched as baby salmon swam up and gulped them almost as soon as they hit the water.  The girls loved this and started killing their own salmon bait and feeding the salmon.  Rangers are great!

Then we hiked two little loop trails.  The Hall of Mosses (.8 round trip) and the Spruce Nature Trail (1.2 RT).  We liked the second hike better because there were fewer people.  We’re not anti-people.  It’s just nicer to hike in solitude.

After this we went back to camp for dinner.  The mosquitoes were swarming so we put up our screen tent.  We have used this to keep out the rain and the sun.  This is the first time we have used it for bugs.  Again – thankful to have it!

The girls and I went to the amphitheater for Ranger Robert’s presentation “If Trees Could Talk.”  We were wearing pants and long sleeves and I wiped our faces with bug spray, but the girls still got two or three mosquito bites on their faces.  The talk was fascinating.  Ranger Robert was a forester for 31 years.  Their motto for timbering was “cut it flat, burn it black, plant in back.”  They thought this was the responsible thing to do, but have since realized the intergenerational connection (literally connected by fungi and roots underground) of trees and know that forests never recover when completely cut down.  (Think “Avatar”).

Then I had another restless night.  Not as bad as usual.  Heart racing.  Was it the Diet Dr. Pepper and two mini Reese’s cups I had at noon?  Other days it doesn’t seem to matter.  It really is frustrating when I want to know why, but can’t figure it out.

Hoh Rain Forest