Days 15-17 - Olympic, WA

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As promised, everything is indeed giant here. As you drive the roads the trees dwarf the cars. You are an ant in their world. Grateful for every moment you get to be among them. Hoping they will pass on even just an ounce of their wisdom. Somehow I doubt that's how the ants feel about us.

 



Even the ferns are giant.




Many trees were hugged.






Even one of the most common wildflowers, foxglove, stands tall and proud.


The gray sky is just morning fog that only touched the coast. It burned off soon after this photo was taken.




Not long after at another beach and not a cloud in the sky.


More interesting rock formations. This is caused by sea foam.


(I have no idea, but it sure looks like it. Maybe a geologist will weigh in if we are lucky.)








The Sol Duc hot springs, where we stayed.


If you are wanting more (as I suspect you do), here is a playlist of short videos of Olympic.

On the drive up to Olympic our listening was dedicated to the 90's grunge band Hole. Say what you will about Courtney Love, but almost thirty years later and Live Through This is still a solid album. Love's raw energy like a shot of espresso. Sharp, bitter, and sweet. The last track is about growing up in Olympia. The lyrics, as they are on many of the tracks, are explicit so I leave it up to you to listen as you wish. If the mom's reading this blog decide to listen, don't worry, I turned out just fine. Maybe even a little better than fine because of Love. 

Anyway, I absolutely loved hiking among the giant trees in Olympic. Each one full of beauty and grandeur. The size of the park was impressive too. It took an hour an a half to two hours to get anywhere. I suspect this helps keep it a less popular park which is just fine with me. 

Every morning we would soak in the hot spring pools. We'd start in the hottest one which was about 108 degrees. When we got too hot we'd do a quick lap in the cool swimming pool which was about 75 degrees. Then back to the hot tub. And repeat. We ended our days the same way. No sore hiking muscles on this trip.

I will say though, while we were there it was pretty dry for a rainforest. The ten day forecast was mid-70s during the day and 50s at night with not a cloud in the sky. The air dry. The moss a little more brown than green. Tristan tried to have ChatGPT assure me that this was normal and that the moss would turn a vibrant green again soon after the rain. But I know better than to be assured by robots.

For me, Olympic is definitely a contender for best national park. It is a world covered in green. It has coasts. It has rainforests. It has hot springs. And of course, it has huge ancient trees. They were born long before I was born and they will die long after I die. I find great comfort in that fact.

States traveled
  • Washington

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Halfway

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After leaving Olympic and heading south along the Oregon coast, it's really starting to feel like we've finished the trip to the Pacific. We've seen a lot of the coast the last couple days. It's rocky and beautiful and windy . But also we've been on the road for about 3 weeks, visited four of the six national parks we're going to see, and driven through 14 states. Soon we'll turn around, spending the next three weeks first up in Portland, then Seattle, then Glacier, and then driving east for a week. Route 20, which starts in Kenmore sq. Boston is the longest road in the US at 3,365 miles, and we've spent a lot of time driving parallel to it (on rt 90, the longest interstate highway in the US). In fact, our cabin by Yellowstone Lake was right off of 20, near where the road originally ended before they extended it all the way to the west coast. Yesterday was July 4th, which time-wise will be almost exactly the halfway point of our trip. Depending on when w...
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Day 1 - Syracuse, NY

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  We left Somerville this morning and are ending our day today in Syracuse, NY. We were on the road for about 6 hours and made tacos for dinner - delicious, tacos never disappoint. The audio highlight of the day was listening to the latest This American Life episode, Must Be Rats on the Brain  - it's us against them. And the visual highlight of the day was crossing the Hudson River - an impressively big river. Our destination tomorrow is Cleveland, OH which will be a similar amount of time on the road, but we don't have to worry about cleaning and packing up so it will be a piece of cake. States traveled Massachusetts New York
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Day 3 - Chicago, IL

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We started our day in Cleveland and are ending it in Chicago. We did some pretty standardly touristy Chicago things like walking along Lake Michigan and checking out Cloud Gate and Buckingham Fountain. But our absolute favorite was Lurie Garden . We chatted with a local who showed us a video he took of the family of foxes that live there! A true urban oasis.  While we usually prefer to look at plants, we did manage to appreciate some architecture as well. We were on the road for about another 6 hours again today. Yesterday's vineyards in New York today turned into corn fields in Ohio and Indiana, patiently awaiting their moment in the sun. The weather was again beautiful for driving, very similar to yesterday. For dinner we ate pizza along the river as we watched tour boats and kayakers traverse the waters.  We entered a new time zone at some point in Indiana. Now we are tired and are going to go to bed early in an attempt to stick to our East coast schedule as long as possibl...
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