Rialto Beach

Last week my crew drove about two hours west of the park to Rialto Beach, a section of the wilderness coastline of Olympic National park. Its publicly owned, so there are no hotels or large commercial buildings of any kind... that tends to make the landscape a lot nicer to look at.

I realize that I've been busting out all of these names and places when you guys (most of you, anyway) don't have any point of reference. So, here's a basic map of the park. Port Angeles is on the top, and the most popular place to go (because of ease of access, proximity to major road, and spectacular view) is Hurricane Ridge, about 17 miles south of town. We've been doing most of our work at Lake Crescent (where we are roofing) and the Heart O' the Hills area (where we are painting). We've also been to Sol Duc to do some trailwork, but generally the weather hasn't been the best for that.


The farthest we've gone is the subject of this post... Rialto Beach, which is next to the Mora campground in the very west and about 2 hours away. (If we go any farther than that in a day, than we stay for the entire week at a bunkhouse so that we only have to do a commute once.)

Now, this was my first trip to the Pacific Ocean, and being such a noob, I had to bring my camera along.

The place was totally badass, and we didn't even get rained on.


There are lots of islands off the coast that are undoubtedly home to man-eating carnivores, primitive cults, and various deadly mushrooms. No one really knows though, because nobody who has ever ventured to these unimaginably savage places has returned to tell the tale. I'm going to swim out to see for myself when it gets warmer.


These coastal areas act as buffers to the inland, and as you can see, take quite a beating from storms. I'd hate to be a giant walking along these beaches... just think of the splinters.








Prolly the coolest thing about the coast here is that it sits right next to the forest. (As opposed to sand dunes, or something) Its a cool contrast. It also makes it pretty dangerous to walk along for long periods of time (seriously.) For many portions they advise hikers to have tide charts so they don't get caught in a situation that requires them to swim to an accessible beach.


We picked a nice big trunk to sit on for lunch. After we ate, we played a little soft toss with stones, skipped some rocks in the surf, and posed for a poorly prepared picture...




People way up the beach were tossing nets in the water for some reason or another. You can vaguely see somebody at the top of this picture.








The reason that we even traveled out here was to take apart a wheelchair access pathway from the beach. The winter gets pretty nasty along the beach I guess, so they avoid any potential for damage. This is an "after" picture.


A banana slug! We found this fat little critter when were cutting down deciduous trees at the ranger station.

After we finished for the day, the ranger who we met at Mora let us all share an apple pie that his wife made for him. It was über tasty, made from apples picked in the park. Everybody is so nice around here... makes it easy to work.

Also, a couple of random things:

First, congratulations to Jen for getting a permanent job and embarking on scuba diving lessons this week.

Second, I sauteed some wild picked mushrooms from the park the other night, and found out I like them. Who'da thought?

Third, I am volunteering at "Streamkeepers", a county organization that monitors water quality and conducts other hydrological research. Specifically, I'll be using ArcGIS (woohoo!!) to help prepare the county for potential storm water ordinances (development is greatly affecting the route/rate of runoff, which could be bad news if it floods). So that's fun, and I'll get to use my brain along with my chiseled biceps.

Fourth, I shot a 44 on a par 37 this weekend, and didn't lose one golf ball. I'm pretty sure that's a first for me.