Because of the many places we visited in Washington, the photos taken in WA are divided into two folders, WA One and WA Two. (Pretty sophisticated numbering system, eh.)

As we left Oregon on the bridge approach, we went up a fairly steep grade to reach the high point of the bridge near the Oregon side of the river. The high point of bridge deck is over 200 feet above the water. I don’t think I was apprehensive, but my wife said I was gripping the truck steering wheel rather tightly. The other side of the high part of the bridge is more gradual. At the time of construction (1966) it was thought the bridge was the longest continuous steel truss bridge in the world (21,677 feet). Exiting the bridge we headed for the CG at Point Disappointment SP. The SP is at the very southwest corner of Washington, near the town of Ilwaco. It was near the first place the “Corps of Discovery” stayed in their quest for the Pacific Ocean. In Late November 1805, they crossed the wide Columbia River to spend the winter in Fort Clatsop, OR. The campground was clean and well maintained with large campsites. The cape is flat with a broad beach and some rough waves a short distance from the shore. There are two lighthouse in the area; North Lighthouse and Cape Disappointment Lighthouse. Nearby the town of Long Beach has a number of good restaurants and an excellent bakery, the Cottage Bakery. Cape Disappointment was named by English Captain John Meares who missed finding the passage up the Columbia River.

Our next CG was inside Olympic NP at Kalaloch. I mispronounced the CG name for two days when someone finally asked where we camping. I told them and they said where it that! In just a short time, I learned to say Clay-Lok. The CG sits on top of a cliff between the ocean (below) and route 101 in a mature mixed forest. We were here for 5 gray days and nights. We visited other areas of the NP such as: Quinult rain-forest, home of the world’s largest Red Cedar tree; The Hoh rain-forest, which receives nearly 170 inches of rain each year, and has “the hall of mosses trail”; Ruby Beach, noted for its many sea stack formations and its abundance of fog; Rialto Beach has giant drift logs, rocky beach and, on the day we were there, heavy fog. Nearby is the town of Forks, whose claim to fame is that the book, _Twilight_ (Vampires) took place there. Forks is located in the far northwest part of the Olympic peninsula.

We left Kalaloch and headed for our next CG, Dungeness Recreation Area (County), near Port Angeles. On the way we stopped at the Storm King and the Elwha visitor’s centers (Olympic NP). The Dungeness CG sits on a bluff overlooking the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Vancouver Island, BC (Canada). The CG was clean, well maintained and the sites were spacious. A trail to the Wildlife Management Area also provided access to the water’s edge. In Port Angeles, we were able to buy some “ugly Dungeness Crabs (one claw missing)”. We also visited the towns of Sequim and Port Townsend where we saw Mt Baker and the Point Wilson Lighthouse. From the CG, we also went to the Olympic Park’s Hurricane Ridge area. We were told by a ranger that Hurricane Ridge receives an average of over 400 inches of snowfall each year.

Leaving Dungeness CG, we headed south to the Belfair State Park CG and Bremerton, where we take the ferry to Seattle. (See Washington Two).