Hoh Rainforest, Forks & Ruby Beach Picture Post
On Saturday, I piled into a car with Lissa, my brother in law J, my youngest sister B and their month-old baby and went on a trip to the Hoh Rainforest. It was very rainy, but lots of fun. We took lots of pictures, but these were the best, in my opinion. Some were taken by me, some by Lissa and some by J. I'd give credit but I'm not sure who took what since I dumped all the photos in the same folder on my desktop when uploading them.
Our attempted first stop. Since I was sitting in the back seat with my sister and the baby, I have no idea what beach this is, only that it is somewhere between Aberdeen, WA and Humptulips, WA. Yes, Humptulips. I admit everyone in the car was about twelve years old for a good five minutes when we saw the name of that town.
Lissa (bumblebat79) helpfully pointed out that that would most likely damage said tulips, and I was reminded of a time in school when the quote "I don't like roses on my piano, but I do like tulips on my organ" slipped past the newspaper editors and caused quite the scandal.
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My sister stayed in the car with the baby while we tried to see if we could just walk to the beach. This is why the road was closed. Lissa wanted to try to cross it, but it was so cold, rainy and windy that she decided that was probably her worst idea of the year so far, not to mention we had no clue how deep it actually was or how strong the current in it was.
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Not the best shot, but it does show how wild the water was. Even from the Road Closed sign we could see the spray from the waves hitting the shore.
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Because of how cold and rainy it was, and the fact that Lissa and I hadn't thought to bring our umbrellas, we stopped at a little store to see if they had rain ponchos. They did, and so we set off again after snapping a few pictures.
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Another shot of the water, from our stop at the store. I like this one because it shows how choppy the waves were. I wish we could have gotten closer but they had a fence up that let everyone know in no uncertain terms that walking down to the beach was not allowed. Thwarted twice! J said we would try another stop after we were done hiking in the rainforest.
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Sanctuary (albeit temporary) from the rain at the visitor center at Hoh Rainforest. There was a sign posted stating that you had to stay 100 feet away from any elk so that they don't get used to humans. We puttered around here for a few moments, getting situated and using the restrooms before hitting the trail. My sister had a special baby sling that she used to keep the baby warm and dry and nestled contentedly under her giant knitted sweater. We decided to take the Hall of Mosses trail as it was one of the shorter trails (only 3/4 of a mile long).
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Probably my favorite picture from the day.
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After we were done hiking in the rainforest, we went ahead and went in to Forks for gas and just to see all the Twilight stuff. This store was the first thing we saw and we all cracked up. I can't blame them for milking Twilight for all it's worth really. Forks really isn't much to look at, although it is still much bigger than my own hometown on the other side of the state. I do wonder if any of the residents here are just over it all, though. Forks would not be where you'd want to live if you weren't a Twilight fan. We actually turned around in the high school parking lot so we could make another pass and get a better shot of this store.
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So my best guess here is that this is the bitter rival store of the other Twilight store in the previous picture. They're actually really close to each other. I wonder if the proprietors glare at each other when they pass each other in town.
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Twilight Tour Van. Who wants to go? I'm not paying. ;)
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This is the store that owns the Twilight Tour Van. Look at the door. That's Jacob, I'm pretty sure. Looks like there are no less than three Twilight stores in forks.
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After we completed our drive by tour of Forks and filled the tank, we stopped here, at Ruby Beach. It was gorgeous, but so cold and ridiculously windy. I want to go back when it's warmer and get some more pictures.
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We walked down to the beach just long enough to take some pictures and then retreat to the car. And this about sums up my trip to the rainforest. We all had a lot of fun despite the weather and made tentative plans to go to Chataqua together this year. It was also neat to take a trip with my sister and just reconnect - we'd kind of drifted apart after I moved to Texas and she got married and moved to NYC.