Day 2 - Olympic Peninsula and beyond

Woke up in Forks with an incredible headache and ibuprofin nausea thanks to beer too close to bedtime and a caffeine deficient diet; bleah. Felt better by mid afternoon. Who cares, eh?

Drove to Ruby Beach where we unsuccessfully tried to photogragh a whale that turned out to be a rock. Got some nice pics of rocks tho! Weather was hazy but comfortable. The west coast of the peninsula was not what I expected; a look at Google Earth might have shown that. The Olympic range appears to cling to the west shore of Puget Sound, and peters out into lumpy wooded hills, extensively logged, all the way to Oregon. The storm which took out Stanley Park also flattened hundreds of acres of the Olympic National Forest. There are signs indicating 3rd growth planting in some areas, with anticipated harvest dates in the distant future; forestry takes the long view here.

Further south there are wide, marshy estuaries everywhere, and small undistinguished settlements. They have a Long Beach here that you can still race around on; we'd have missed it if we'd let Tim drive. Somtimes ya just gotta take charge! Aberdeen, which was to be our overnight stop, is a large turn-of-the-century logging town which hasn't seen better days since it was built, by the look of it. We pressed on.

Astoria, OR on the other hand, has some spectacular old buildings, and sweeping vistas from the hilltops, overlooking the BIG mouth of the Columbia. Our entrance was via the longest bridge we've ever been on, which rises rather forbiddingly as it approaches town. We circled the hills once and headed again for the coast and Seaside, where we dined on Ahi tuna and cajun catfish, bought scotch, Smirnoff's Tuscan Lemonade and a big bottle of Oh Canada Maple Liqueur from a roadside stand, and retired to bedlam.