This year, Summer vacation came late. I was unable to break away from work until the weekend of this trip. Highlights of the trip are, Sequim Bay State Park, Port Angeles Crab and Seafood Festival,The Town of Forks (Vampire Capitol of the Northwest), Bogachiel State Park, Neah Bay (Home of the Makah Tribe).
We got a late start and took a ride across Puget Sound on the Edmonds Kingston ferry. It was dark, raining, and very windy. Even more so crossing the Sound. One gust with quite a force behind it, hit my coat just right and blew my jacket zipper down and flung my coat wide open. I decided to head inside the ferry after that. The crossing takes enough time to get a decent walk by making several laps of the perimeter of the ferries interior so I joined in with others doing the same.
This is a shot under the pilot house looking forward in the center. Much less wind standing in the center.
This is a view looking forward from the right side. Kingston city lights in the distance.
We made it to Sequim Bay State Park about 10:00 PM . Kelli found we had hotspot internet service on our smart phones.
Kelli decided to entertain Charlie and watched movies on YouTube.
Tonight’s feature films seemed to be focused on birds and rats.
Here a few pictures from walking around Sequim Bay SP.
Our campsite, # 81, had a great view looking out over Sequim Bay.
There was another TC (Truck Camper)in the site to our left. They had taken off early.
Sequim Bay.
A walk down to the parks fishing pier and looking out onto Sequim Bay.
The park has a nice athletic field on the other side of the highway via an underpass tunnel.
This is the baseball field.
Here are the tennis courts and place to play basketball.
Here is the tunnel heading back to the State Park.
Looking through the tunnel.
I knew we were going to be getting a lot of rain over the next few days since we were going to be on the Olympic Peninsula.
The TC has a couple spots in question as far as water infiltration go. I used some white electrical tape to seal the bottom edge trim metal.
I had already recaulked the windows but wanted to make sure this section was sealed so I could do work on it later and have it dry.
So far, the tape has worked well and none of the questionable spots have moisture.
Here we are at the Port Angeles Crab and Seafood Festival. At $30.00, it was a bit pricey but goes to a good charity.
Oh yes, Crab!
All nice and festive inside under the tent. Local Peninsula Vintners selling samples of their wine at the far end.
Close up of the giant crab.
That ship is the Blackball Ferry CO. ferry COHO leaving Port Angeles and heading to Victoria BC.
The Coast Guard station is on the land spit off in the distance.
The lookout tower on the pier.
The view from top of the tower, looking back at the festival and Port Angeles.
Here is a photo from 1980 of the old Port Townsend and Southern RR that used to serve the cities along the Straight of Juan de Fuca.
This RR traveled through the center of Sequim Bay SP. The tracks are gone and the Right of Way is now a nice long bike path.
Here is an HO Scale Model RR of the Prototype.
This layout was recently featured in Model Railroader Magazine as the Port Thomas and Southern RR.
Here is one of old RR Signals
Kelli decided to support a local artist and bought some of her work.
This is a display in the Port Angeles Aquarium on the pier at the festival.
It’s got a couple nice displays for a small aquarium.
This is a model of the Elwah Dam and demonstrates it’s removal to restore the Elwah River to it’s status as one of the great Salmon runs.
Olympic National Park information about the project.
Wikipedia on the Elwah Dam and River.
We left Port Angeles and the Crab Festival moving on to a favorite escape. Salt Creek CG.
It was a cold, dark, and rainy night when we arrived at Salt Creek.
The creatures of the night were just beginning to come out from under the covers.
That night, it rained and rained. Here is our campsite in the morning.
There were several tent campers around us who spent their nights inside their cars and Subaru’s.
All the tent campers were soaked from the lakes that formed under them in each campsite. Not very happy campers so to say.
I did almost feel guilty cooking sausage, eggs, hash browns, and toast with coffee. The stove vent spreading our
breakfast aromas throughout the nearby camp area. There were some looks as I did my morning walk around the CG holding my go cup with mocha in it.
Here are some pictures of the area during my walk in the rain.
Just a note. There is a WWII 16” two turret gun emplacement at the top of the hill in the CG that’s pretty cool.
That can be seen in an earlier trip report on Port Angeles, Salt Creek, and General Area. Prior Trip Report from 2009.
There is also a machine gun bunker I’ll show quick. The report also has pictures from Hurricane Ridge.
This picture is of a little island in Crescent Bay. Migrating whales come into this bay to rub the sandy bottom to remove stuff from their skin.
The beach with the tide out.
This image looks out onto Tongue Point, a bird sanctuary at low tide.
Machinegun bunker.
International marker from a treaty agreed to in 1908 with Canada.
The resident deer population of Salt Creek Park. There are signs warning that Cougars are in the area.
We headed out from Salt Creek to drive along the Straight of Juan de Fuca Scenic Highway 112 where our first stop was Lyre River CG to check it out.
Lyre River WA. ST. DNR. Lyre River Wikipedia.
I later read that the week before we were here, (Story)
the body of a fisherman who had been missing, I think for about a month,
was recovered from a log pile a little up river from this one in the Lyre River CG.
We had another unusual event happen later during this trip report in Forks, WA.
Kelli busy taking pictures.
Kelli’s picture.
On the road in the rain.
We made it to Forks, WA. It’s a small town and the only town of size serving the western side of the Olympic Peninsula.
Forks enjoyed some added tourism while the Twilight movies were playing. The fad has died a bit now.
The picture is of one of the Twilight related business that has folded. Ironically, the next week after this picture was taken,
The whole block burnt down, see following picture.
Oddly enough, this same block burnt down 87 years before this too.
The larger Odd Fellows building that was on the left, is already burnt to the ground.
The other Twilight themed store across the street is still there.
Hopped into the camper to check on Charlie and he looks like he’s doing fine, just add food.
Farm and barn outside of Forks.
A Shay Steam Locomotive on display in Forks.
Stopped to look at a lake along the road #113 while on the way to Neah Bay.
A quick blast through Clallam Bay.
You can see how nasty the weather was that day. Look at the rain cloud that moved in within a few minutes time.
A sexy town mascot. Me thinks these people need to get out more. Yes, those are rain drops streaking by.
The town of SEKIU. Several RV resorts catering to the fishing crowd.
Arriving at the MAKAH Indian Reservation. This is at the entrance to the Makah Museum.
We highly recommend visiting the Makah Museum.
Neah Bay.
The Marina.
The Ranger at Bogachiel SP told us to go to Take Home Fish when we got to Neah Bay.
We bought some salmon jerky and smoked COHO salmon. Very tasty.
Again, we showed up on an interesting day. The man who runs Take Home Fish is a butcher and does a good business out of his shop.
On the day we came to visit, he had just finished butchering a cougar for the first time in his life.
This is the front half, rib cage. Second image is the hind quarters in a meat locker along with two deer behind it.
He said he ate some and that it tasted very much like pork. He said there are lots of cougar on the reservation.
This island has an interesting story to it.
The lady at the museum told us about the fabrics the tribe used to make on looms from pounded cedar bark strands and the long hair from a dog they grew just for their hair.
This practice or art form ended over 100 years ago when it became easier to purchase cloth from traders.
The Makah grew the dogs on the island in the picture for their long hair to make the cloth but when the easy cloth from traders came available, the art of the loom was ended.
The dogs were lost to history, eaten would make sense.
Wondered why this hillside was terraced. It’s been that way for a while judging by the tree growth.
We continued driving out to the point of Neah Bay and planned to walk out to Tatoosh Island
but the walk was 30 minutes and we didn’t want to leave the camper unattended getting close to dark.
Cell Phone Camera Zoom. Can’t believe I left my EOS 5D and L Series lenses at home.
That was thick forgetting all my photographic equipment when that was the whole purpose of the trip.
Closer Zoom. The cell phone camera did save the day for both of us. Dang handy devices. Nokia Lumia 900’s.
Lots of fall colors and flowers in the area. Just a spectacular view.
Please don’t eat these. A little Doris Day reference there. A childhood crush.
We were lucky to find this vantage point. Instead of parking at the trailhead for Tatoosh Island, we
saw a dirt road off to the right and took it. In keeping with the motto that all dirt roads lead to something cool, or Rome.
We drove a couple miles up it and noticed a clearing to the right and that was our vantage point.
I would bet you could camp there but might want to seek a permission from the reservation office first.
Self portrait with Tatoosh Island in the distance.
The truck and camper wanted their picture too. Didn’t think to ask Charlie. Next time.
Thought this was cool Native Art on a barn.
This is a view looking north. This beach is directly accessible from an RV park on the Makah Reservation.
From the same location looking southwest.
The Makah are trying hard to keep a healthy tribe.
There are lots of signs like this with different slogans to reinforce good behavior.
Just about sunset and a straight shot drive all the way back home to Seattle.
We would have liked to stay a couple more days but the weather was never really nice.
Kelli had also developed a full blown cold and so that was enough for this trip.
It was near dark but I wanted to walk out on this beach and see the creek as it flowed into the Straight of Juan de Fuca.
And that concludes this trip report. The object was to see the fall colors.
We have gone on the NATCOA fall colors caravan 1, NATCOA fall colors caravan 2, the last two or three years but we missed the Crab Festival that used to be our regular fall trip.
The seafood festival is a lot of fun for us and we like the Salt Creek CG especially when the weather is nice and we can have a fire.
This trip works well enough for fall colors. We got to see some new things and we left enough things to see to warrant another couple trips later this or next year.
Hope you enjoyed the show.
END!