the parental files: day 2

Some days things just fall into place; like waking up a little later, hustling, and basically driving you car onto the 9:10 ferry from Edmonds to Kingston as it’s pulling away.  Today was not one of those days, unfortunately.

With a somewhat later start than we’d hoped, Mom, Dad, and I accepted the latter ferry departure (rather than expose my parents to my gotta-make-the-ferry rally car driving) and made our way 30 minutes north to the ferry terminal (my record is 17 minutes, thank you very much) after stopping at PCC to fill the cooler with lunch supplies and ice.  Ah, PCC–not only is the food beautiful, but everyone is so nice–the marketers have reached their demographic.

The destination was Olympic National Park, specifically Hurricane Ridge, a visitor center 18 miles or so in the park atop–you guessed it–a ridge.  Mom was surprised that cars were lining up to drive onto the Spokane when it docked; used to the smaller ferries on the east coast (Block Island, etc) used to transport passengers and bikes, she hadn’t realized that we’d be taking the entire car over to the peninsula.  If we didn’t, I explained, we’d be staying in Kingston, since the park was actually a little over an hour and a half drive from where we’d be getting off the boat: the peninsula is deceptively wide.

I’ve always been a fan of the ferries and it was great to be with Mom and Dad on their first ride in Seattle.  Say what you will, but the few extra dollars one spends to trade an hour of driving for a whimsical 30-minute water transport under to towering figures of the approaching Olympic range is well worth it.  And they have cookies in the cafeteria, so there’s that.

After deboating we made our way towards Port Angeles, passing through the sidewinds on the hood canal bridge and over the rolling hills of standing pine, actively logged on US Forestry land.  We made a brief stop on tribal land to take a photo of the tidal flats, and a slight detour at Port Gamble.  A small, New-England influenced logging town, Port Gamble provided and opportunity to stretch the legs and visit the general store and look at earrings (Mom) and berate Mom for having too many friggin’ earrings (Dad).

We then pressed on to the bottom visitors’ center of the National Park.  With news that the road was open (snow-ins can happen year round) we started the 17-mile drive to the top of the ridge, and were treated to ever-expanding views of the surrounding mountains.  About halfway up the road the cloud cover choked out the light and we found ourselves driving half the speed limit in a cloaking fog, unable to see more than 30 feet in front of the car.  As the car rose higher the fog cleared, but the upper cloud cover lingered, blocking out the sun as we reached the top parking lot.

Donning a few extra layers we took a look around the area; to the west stood Mt. Olympus and the rest of the Olympic range; behind us were fields of lupine (a purple alpine flower), and all around us, as the click of several cameras indicated, were deer with their yearling fawns, out grazing in the fields.  Making our way toward the visitor center Mom drew close to a deer grazing on a hillside; apparently when there are as many of them on the ridge as there are squirrels in central park, they become fairly accustomed to tourists with cameras.  I took the first of many shots just as a woman started clapping to scare the animal off, in the interest of not letting it get domesticated.  She had, of course, become an animal behavior expert after she’d finished taking her own pictures; Mom gave her the evil eye “What the heck did she do that for?”  I patted her on the back and glared right along with her–damn right, Mom.  The deer stuck around anyway.

The sky opened up on the front deck as most of the tourists cleared out, giving us a great panoramic view of the snow-capped peaks across Grand Valley.  Adjustable telescopes provided the opportunity to view the collection of shrinking hanging glaciers that call the Olympics home, and again, the deer popped their heads up from the brush on the entire hillside down into the valley.

We made a nice lunch on an indoor table and then decided to take a little walk; the top of the ridge has a number of half-mile paved loops, some of which were still under small deposits of wet summer snow.  We walked one flat loop to an outlook looking east and bumped into a family of deer.  Heading north, we looked at the terminus of the ridge and bumped into more deer.  We tried to take a trail into the woods and ran into some snow, and of course more deer.  It is hard to not get caught up in hearing fawns bleat for their mother when tourists come wandering through the snow and startle them.

The last path was to an outlook looking south/southeast, but the cost was a rigorous climb of several hundred feet; I’d assumed we’d call it a day and would head back to the car, but Mom convinced Dad and me that this was well within her abilities and demonstrated this to us by attacking the hill like she had something to prove.  With rest stops every 50 feet or so, Mom calmly–and rather quickly–climbed her way to the top of the peak, where we posed for the pictures she had earned.

A quick walk back down and we were at the parking lot, amused by the emboldened deer that were taking the declining number of visitors as license to cut through the parking lot of bound over stone walls.  After sitting and watching for a few minutes, we started up the car and headed back down into the cloud.

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The next stop on the itinerary (it was already getting late) was one that the folks did for me.  For almost a year I’d been obsessed with the Elwa Dam Removal project, and had even planned on attending the initial dam demolition (explosions!) but had been barred by the marriage of two good friends.  Clearly they had no regard for the Elwa watershed or its homeless salmon.  What I hadn’t known was that the viewing area (most of the region is closed due to shifting sediment from 100 years of river blockage) was a mere 20 minutes from the entrance of the park.

Down a wide, foxglove-lined path was a viewing glass looking down into the Elwa restoration area.  Mom thought it was cool.   Dad loved the clarity of the looking glass.  I was excited to finally see the project I’d been following so closely for so long.  It was fascinating, and the folks humored my rambling about ecological restoration the entire way back to the car.

walking the trail

inspecting the old dam site

you can practically see the salmon run!

“yes, yes, this looks in order.” dad liked the clarity.

We raced back to make the earlier ferry, which didn’t exist because I’d somehow screwedup the times.  With the day approaching the 9 o’clock hour it seemed appropriate to consider dinner; fortunately, the Kingston ferry stop is home to a wonderful creperie.  After we’d parked the car in the ferry line we walked to the place, ordered some crepes, and enjoyed the evening air on an outside table.  In a moment of unfortunate timing, a large group walked up before we had a chance to order a dessert crepe, and as cars began to unload I became too nervous to wait any longer; it was time to head back to the car.  Later reports would indicate that we did indeed have plenty of time to order the crepes, and for that, Mom, I still apologize.

crepe time

The ride home allowed the opportunity for us to watch the glowing Seattle skyline in the distance.  With the colder weather our time spent on the deck in the cutting winds was short, but the large windows of the ferry were just as  We met up at Kevin’s apartment after the drive home, and oddly, didn’t get the impression that he was upset to not have us around for a few hours.  The rest of the evening was spent enjoying the Olympic games and appreciating the talent of the best athletes in ‘merica.