June 2012
Olympic National Park: Coast Hike

We recently spent a week in Washington for our vacation.  We ate and drank our fill in Seattle, then headed out to the coast for a beach hike in Olympic National Park.  This was supposed to be a 3 day, 2 night backpacking trip.  We flew with all of our camping and hiking equipment from Arizona.  Unfortunately, living in Arizona, we forgot about factoring weather into the equation.  It was raining the day the hike started and was supposed to have storms and 40 knot (46.1 MPH) winds the entire next day.  Not my idea of a fun beach backpacking trip.  The kicker - the overland trails had sections of 5 inch mud.  Made for a very messy and long day hike.  When we got to camp, we decided to call it quits, turn around, and hike back to the car.  Well, at least we learned something!

The start of the hike out to Third Beach

On the way to Third Beach

Entering Third Beach

Third Beach/Strawberry Bay

Jackie at Third Beach

Aaron at Third Beach

Once we reached Third Beach we ran into two rangers, who asked us about our plans (and probably thought we were crazy for heading out in the bad weather!).  They indicated that the marker for the overland part of the trail was missing, but indicated that if we walked out towards the waterfalls, we had gone to far.  The way up proved harder to find than we thought, but eventually we found the rope to pull ourselves up the muddy bank.  The next several miles included ropes, stairs, and very muddy trails.

Pulling myself up the trail

These stairs are much harder on the way down!

Pulling myself up the stairs

Much of what happened after this point that was NOT photographed.  We ran into another overnight hiker, who was heading out alone.  We had to hike over some cliffs with the tides right below us.  When we made it to Giants Graveyard and Strawberry point, where there was a 4 foot tide zone.  The tide was MUCH higher than 4 foot when we reached it and so we knew we couldn't go on.  Wet and tired, we headed back to a campsite we saw above Scotts Bluff.

On the way back, some of the gound crumbled under me and I started to slide off the edge of a cliff (with the ocean 20 feet below me).  Aaron had to help me get my backpack off so that I could use my poles to help get back up the side of the cliff.  Not my favorite moment of the trip, but there were no tears, which means it was a success!

Once we made it back to the campsite, we contemplated setting up camp and trying to keep everything dry, but eventually agreed to head back to the car and find a dry place to sleep. 

These are happy faces on the way back to Third Beach