6/8/02 1:30 PM Pacific

Right now we're sitting in our car in line at the ferry dock Northwest of Anacortes, waiting to make the trip out to San Juan Island. The sky is partly cloudy but the sun in shining down and I can see what I assume are the North Cascades off to the right at about two o'clock.

Did I mention that I bought a hat? I did, in fact, buy a hat. It is from the main Olympic National Park main visitor center just South of Port Angeles. It's a kinda floppy "fisherman" style hat with an ONP logo embroidered in the front. I'm sure you'll see it in some of our vacation pictures. Lauren says I look cute, if somewhat dorky. It's my kind of hat.

After leaving the park [on Thursday] we turned West on SR-101 for the long drive West and South to the coast. Along the way we drove through some of the most beautiful country I have ever seen. I realize I've been saying this sort of thing a great deal in relation to this part of our trip. Get used to it. Also don't take the repetition as being exaggeration, nor as something that you can ignore or discount. I may be repeating myself but the land is not, and even two days later I'm still blown away by what we have seen.

After driving for a little while the road moved back into the edge of the park and then came to what I think must be the perfect lake. The name of the place is Lake Crescent and it lies just within the Northern edge of the park. 101 winds around the shore of the lake in a way which is thoroughly delightful to drive, and the route provides ample opportunity to gaze at the lushly forested hills and the amazing colour of the water. Here are a couple of pictures.

All I can really say about it is this: if I had to pick one spot to vacation at for the rest of my life, this would be it.

After the road eventually left the lake we drove out of the National Park and into the National Forest. Here things became not so beautiful. It's not that the land itself was less gorgeous, it's that the area turned out to be pretty well logged. It made me unhappy so I'm not going to dwell on it.

Eventually we turned off 101 to drive out towards the coast. We had chosen as our destination a 1.4 mile hiking trail that would take us to a place named Third Beach. The drive didn't take us too long and we quickly found ourselves at the trailhead. We got the stuff we wanted, locked the car, and plunged into the thick, green woods.

We found ourselves walking through a primeval forest that looked like it had come straight out of the Mesozoic. Everywhere we looked was covered in vegetation of all shapes and sizes. Unable to find ground in which to put down roots, seedlings grew out of the decaying hulks of giants long ago felled by age or elements. Everywhere colossal stumps and logs sat rotting upon the forest floor, giving themselves up to decay and disintegration, and in the process providing food to the new life all around them. It was incredible to see this thriving rain forest on all sides of us, for that is where we were.

30-40 minutes of hiking soon brought us our first, furtive glimpse of the vast Pacific Ocean. Minutes later the vista opened up before us and the heaving blue desert lay spread before us. What a sight to see, and not another human being anywhere. We wandered the beach for an hour, taking pictures and just drinking in the views all around us. We collected some beach rocks for my mother, as well as a piece of driftwood. I'm sure we walked at least a mile or more going up and down the sand.

We finally started back once our feet and legs began screaming in pain, and beautiful as it was, the hike back to our car was an uncomfortable one.

I should mention that throughout this entire trip the weather has been beyond perfect. This includes right up to the time of my writing (6/8/02 , 8:15 PM). If this is normal summer weather for the Pacific Northwest then all of the people who constantly gripe about the bad weather are full of shit. If this isn't normal weather then we really lucked out.

The drive back to Port Angeles was scenically uneventful and we got checked in to our hotel easily, if late. By the time we were ready to eat we had few choices and ended up dining at the motel restaurant. The food was decent and not too expensive. After dinner we went back up to our room and soon to bed. Now that I am finally done writing about Thursday I can finally move on to Friday and marathon ferries. I shall attempt to start on that later this evening.