Hurricane Ridge Olympic Nationl Park, WA

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Hurricane Ridge Olympic Nationl Park, WA

Thursday 9/6/2012

The second day while staying in Sequim, WA, we drove 20 miles west on Hwy. 101 to Port Angeles.

The road going to Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park is located in Port Angeles. The drive goes from sea level to 5,242 feet above sea level in just 17 miles. My hands were sweating as we drove up. This really surprised me, because I am usually good at going up , and Joe is not. He was driving and seemed just fine. I was just worrying about the long 17 miles coming down on the outer edge.

Here we were getting close to the top.

We pull into the parking lot and ate our lunch while viewing the top of the world!

As we eat, a deer walks in front of our car, below the sidewalk and wall.

People were just a couple of feet from it, taking it's picture and it didn't bother it.

After lunch we walked down to the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center.

Behind the Visitor Center was a viewing platform with information about Hurricane Ridge and surrounding mountains.

Olympic National Park consist of dramatic coast, rain forest and rugged mountains.

What an awesome view!

In the last 40 years the Olympic Mountains have lost 30% of it's glaciers.

This exhibit shows you the height of all the Olympic Mountains.

We decided to take one of the trails at Hurricane Ridge. We walked to Cirque Rim Trail to the overlook first.

At the overlook, you get a view of Port Angeles down below.

In 2003, a fire took out the evergreens on Griff Peak.

With my zoom, I could get a picture of Vancouver Island across the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

We continued our hike at Hurricane Ridge.

Our hike was taking us to the top of this mountain.

A zoom in, shows other hikers on the trail.

Here we were at the top of the trail, looking down at the road that we drove on to get up to Hurricane Ridge.

Another view following the road down.

This is a trail that goes out to Sunrise Point. Joe said he wasn't going to walk that trail! It is bit too steep for me also.

Another trail from our trail, that takes you on a 3.8 miles hike to Klahhane Ridge. We skipped that one also.

Our trail, High Ridge Trail looped around with the visitor center and parking lot in view.

Our trail looks steep, but it wasn't, or we wouldn't have done it.

Great view of a valley below.

View of Morse Creek below.

From the point we were standing at, we got another view of the trail that goes to the Klahhane Ridge.

Once you were up at Hurricane Ridge, the views were well worth the drive up.

We were "Blessed" with a perfect day also.

The weather is very unpredictable at Hurricane Ridge, so you should check the weather reports before you go up.

I laid in the grass for this picture. After I got up, Joe read a sign that said to stay on the trail because walking off the trail can kill certain plants. Opps!

Close up of Mount Olympus.

As we got to the end of the trail, we saw the people in the picnic area enjoying a glass of wine. I told Joe I wanted to get down the mountain before they left.

A sign told us that there were goats here also, but we didn't see any that day.

One last view as we get back to the car. I started to get nervous about our drive back down.

This is Joe, checking Diane's blog before publishing, just wanted to say that these pictures are awesome and the view in person was as usual, even better. One of the best views of our travels.

See why I was nervous.

I just don't understand why they do not have guard rails on these steep drop offs.

It could take just one deer to run out in front of you to cause you to swerve off the road.

I am glad I got to see Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park, but I don't think I ever want to make the trip up again. Once is enough.

I liked it much better when we got where there were at least trees along the side of the road.

It didn't seem to bother Joe as much as it did me. I never would have made it down if I was driving!

I really enjoyed coming to these tunnels.

Further down the road there was a pull out that we stopped at.

Another deer just below the parking area.

I think this is a view of Sequim and the Dungeness Spit and Lighthouse out from Sequim. The spit is the world longest naturally occurring sandspit at 5.5 miles long and is the home to the Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge.