First Visit to Olympic

Olympic National Park: the land of glaciated mountain tops, stately evergreens, and crisply flowing streams. That's where I'll be working, and that's where I took a trip to for the first time yesterday.

I drove up to the visitor's center, about a mile and half from my apartment, and walked in to gather some information. I bought a topo/trail map, and strolled up to the ranger's desk. After being told that most of the trail heads and the most popular spot, Hurricane Ridge, were at least 17 miles further, I walked with resignation back to my truck... I was hoping to be able to walk to work every day.

Undeterred, I drove the rest of the way to the top of Hurricane Ridge, where a bigger visitor's center and parking lot sat. At first, the thought of such an easy drive to a very spectacular view seemed unfair. Why, when I would be willing to sweat out the hike, should just anybody be able to enjoy this without the work? Mulling this over, and staring at a pair of old coots sitting in a Jag, I decided that it was actually pretty cool that this was available for people who couldn't necessarily do the hike. There were plenty of other hikes I could have all to myself, anyway.

So, once again I entered a visitor's center, this time in hopes of finding out the best hike to get a feel for the park. I talked to a younger, fully bearded ranger, and he showed me on the map his favorite hike in the vicinity. "It's a tough one, though," he warned. I nodded in a concerned manner, secretly sporting a cocky grin in my head. I burst out the door with an extra pep in my step.

5 hours later I was ready to collapse. Totally worth it though. And I sure showed the ranger, eh?



Just entering the park.



I had to stop my truck while a family of deer took their sweet time to walk across the road. I was able to snap this photo of the last jaywalker.



Boots, backpack, map. That's it, folks.



So this was that ranger's favorite hike, the Switchback trail. He told me that it was a 1,500 foot elevation in a mile and a half, only for advanced hikers. Um, yea, I think I'll do that.



So the first leg of the hike, was from the foreground (you can see the trail in the shadows), to just below Mt. Angeles in the background.



Halfway up.







About 2/3 the way up the hike I looked up and saw what appeared to be a launched rocket. 'Course it was just a plane leaving a contrail, but the angle I had was pretty cool.



Made it to Klahhane Ridge! That's Mount Baker in the background, about 120 miles away or something like that.



That's PA down there. You can see where I live... kind of.





Lake Angeles.





So cool, it looks like a giant blanket of dark green draped over the mountains.





This is the road that I drove up to get to the visitor's center.