Olympic National Park: Hoh Rain Forest

Of all the places we ventured on this road trip, Olympic National Park would probably edge out the others as my favorite. It’s just so completely different than any other landscape I’ve encountered. James was actually a little disappointed because it was sunny as could be that day and he was hoping for the gloomy overcast weather that’s typical of the region. However, I think he’s crazy because it was still quite the experience.

Our day started off in Aberdeen, Washington where we stayed in the least pleasant motel of the trip. However, for all we cared it was the Ritz because it had a bed and a shower and a roof. Our air mattress pretty much died at Crater Lake, so sleeping on anything not the ground was a plus for the rest of the trip!

The weather on the drive to the park looked promising (again, in James’s opinion) and we both geeked out over how ‘X-Files’ the whole area felt. Of course, by the time we arrived at the Hoh Rain Forest, all the clouds had burned off and it turned out to be a really lovely, sunny day. Never fear, we’d get more fog later on…

The trails at this part of the park are really more like nature walks, so we leisurely took photos of almost every moss-covered thing in sight.

{Then we came across the river and obviously had to play around in that for awhile…}

It’s ridiculous the amount of pictures I took of moss and the things it grows on! Realize that what I’m posting is just a fraction of the options I had to choose from…

{Obligatory cheesy, posed shots. We were on vacation after all.}

Next up: We spend the night along the park’s ocean edge (my first backpacking excursion!) with some incredibly vocal sea lions.