Washington State National Parks - Part 3 - Olympic National Park

Kris and I flew to Seattle to embark on a 3 week Washington state National Parks road trip in August. This is Part 3 - Olympic National Park

See Washington State National Parks - Part 1 - Mount Rainier here

See Washington State National Parks - Part 2 - Leavenworth / Islands

Olympic National Park must be the most diverse park in the country. It has a little bit of everything but each of those things pack a big punch. Snow peaked mountains and all the steep ascent hiking you want, lush fairyland old growth rainforests, and an extremely wild coastline teeming with life and danger around every corner (giant logjams, sneaker waves and crazy tides).

The weather dictated whether we would go into the mountains or stay in the lowland rainforest and coastal areas. After all, you didn’t want to do a big mountain hike and have fog and low clouds as your only view…which would have been the case for most of our time there. 

We lucked out our first day and got in a little bit of clear sky mountain hiking before the clouds rolled in. After that, a rainy and foggy forecast sent us to the rainforest and coastal areas. Air temps were in the 50s most of our time there which ended with a couple nice partly sunny days in the 60s.

One of the things to know about Olympic National Park is that it's quite large and requires a lot of driving to get to the different sections of the park. It's a "hub and spoke" type park, whereas the main road circles the outer edges of the park and there are several minor roads that lead out and back to/from the main areas to visit. 

Highlights included:

• Driving & hiking the Hurricane Ridge & Obstruction Point areas with 360 degree views of Mount Olympus & other peaks. 
• Cape Flattery - the most NW point in the lower 48 states with bonus points for a distant whale sighting plus bald eagles & elephant seals/harbor seals. 
• Hoh Rainforest - Lush, wet & green. The most moss & the biggest ferns you’ll ever see in one place, not to mention the moss covered 200 ft tall Western Hemlocks & Douglas Firs. Hoh Rainforest gets an average of 140 inches of rain a year. By comparison, nearby Seattle gets an average 35 inches of rain a year. It was a truly magical place that made us feel like we were in a fairy tale. The Sol Duc Falls & Ancient Groves hikes provided similar sights. 
• Rialto Beach, Second Beach, Ruby Beach, Kalaloch & Beach 4 walks were amazing. Gigantic logjams & rocky points for miles. Surfers were enjoying the waves at La Push beach. When we pulled up to Kalaloch, it was the cleanest nicest overhead waves I’ve seen in a long time & they had me mind surfing. 
• We stayed at the historic Lake Quinault Lodge at the end of our time in ONP & it had a very nice & relaxed atmosphere.

Day 1 

For the first part of our Olympic National Park experience, we stayed at the Olympic Lodge in Port Angeles for 3 nights. It was a very nice hotel and a good base for our adventures into the northern part of the park. 

We drove up to Mount Angeles to do some hiking

Our first hike was Sunrise Point

We then hiked the longer Hurricane Hill via Hurricane Ridge trail. It started out sunny, but the fog and clouds rolled in right as we got to the summit viewpoint. 

The cloudy view at the top of Hurricane Hill

We then drove the scenic 15 mile dirt off-road to Obstruction Point and I took a short hike in that area.

Since it got cloudy on us, we then made the drive back down the mountain and hiked to Sol Duc Falls

Ancient Groves - a peaceful and short loop trail off the road leading to Sol Duc Falls. A cool walk amongst awesome giant trees.

the requisite tree hugging photo

Taking advantage of the cloudy afternoon, we then wrapped the day of hiking at Marymere Falls

Marymere Falls

Day 2

The next day, low clouds consumed the area, so our planned hike to Mount Storm King was shelved in favor of driving out to Neah Bay and Cape Flattery, the most northwest point in the contiguous United States. This is outside the national park and is a Makah Tribal Territory. Arriving in Neah Bay, and before proceeding to Cape Flattery, we had a really good fresh fish & chips lunch at Calvin's Crab House.

The Adirondack chairs and scenic view in front of Calvin's Crab House in Neah Bay

Cape Flattery

We saw a bald eagle at this spot

We saw multiple whales spouting in the distance close to Cape Flattery Lighthouse Island (pictured above), as well as seals and sea lions sunning themselves and playing on small rocky islands.

Day 3

It was time to make our way to the western side of Olympic National Park and explore the rocky coastline. We did a few beach hikes on this day. See below for the beach hikes we did. They had amazing views, big rock jutting out from the ocean, gigantic logjams and downed trees on the beach, tidal pools with sea life, and smooth rock pebbles the size of your hand covering the entire beach.

a sign posted at the beach trailhead

Rialto Beach to Hole In the Wall trail

To cross this river mouth, we had to navigate our way across this logjam so we could get to Hole in the Wall.

Hole in the Wall

Second Beach trail - those waves

A sign on the way to Kalaloch Beach - this area was used in the filming of the "Twilight" film series.

Kalaloch Beach

Kalaloch Lodge - our stay that night - rustic and scenic

The view from the Kalaloch Lodge grounds

The waves here were amazing, long peeling right handers. No one was out surfing these amazing looking waves. 

The way we used to call home to let our parents know we were still alive.

Day 4

The next day, we made our way to the Hoh Rainforest, and walked both loops, the Hall of Mosses and Spruce Nature Trails. 

Hoh Rainforest

Amazing lush canopy of greenery everywhere

Next up was a walk on Ruby Beach - the sun finally came out for us and it warmed up.

Ruby Beach

We ended the beach walks with a scenic walk along Beach 4

then ended up at the Lake Quinault Lodge for our last night in the park. 

Lake Quinault Lodge - a nice end to our Olympic National Park adventure - very scenic and peaceful

Day 5

We started our last day with a lazy morning and short hike along Lake Quinault.

Lake Quinault

Inside the historic Lake Quinault Lodge

We were going to do some hiking in the southeastern portion of Olympic National Park on the way back to Seattle (we were thinking Staircase Rapids and/or Mount Elinor), but we simply ran out of steam. 

We instead opted to stop in Tacoma on the way to our Seattle airport hotel (as we had an early flight the next morning) for a walk along the scenic Ruston Way Waterwalk and Point Defiance Park. If you're ever in Tacoma, this is a nice place for a scenic water side walk + shopping/restaurants.

Our departure flight from Seattle gave us a nice view of Mount St Helens (above), and Mount Adams and Mount Hood (below)