A Day in the Rainforest! Sept 23

Today was a non-riding day due to the forecast of rain, and the wish to sight see in the rain forest of the great north west!  Enjoy the pictures!!

First we stopped at the Forks Timber Museum, but it was closed!  This was their outside exhibit.  This is a monument to all the loggers who lost their lives since pre-40's!  They had each decade represented.

Mike is such a cut-up!!!!

Old tree made into a shelter.

Old logging and mill equipment

At the Forks (we are staying in Forks, WA) Visitor Center, we discovered that the "Twilight" books were set in Forks, Washington.  They get 5-8,000 visitors a month in the summer to visit just because of the books!!!

Across the street from the museum is an airstrip/dragstrip!  Seriously!  I'm not making this up!  And today, there was a herd of elk grazing next to the airstrip.  Good thing a plane wasn't trying to land!!!  Small towns.... you gotta love them!

Heading down the road towards the Hoh Rain Forest in the Olympic National Park

Check out all the moss on the trees!

We stopped at the Rain Forest Cafe and Mike made a new friend!

Looking up at one of the largest cedar trees in the country

Yeah, it's that big!  They think it's 500-550 years old!

In the rain forest!

The phone booth at the Hoh Rain Forest visitors center!

Ranger humor!

Walking on a trail thru the rain forest - in the rain!

Shelf fungus on the tree

Moss draped trees

Good scenery for a vampire movie!

The lumps on the trees are called burls.

The ferns are everywhere

Looks like Halloween decorations!

There were lots of huge trees!

Looking at the Olympic Mountains

Looking out from Ruby Beach

The ocean was very rough

Beautiful!

The trees wash down from the mountains in rivers, then they lay on the beach and get wash out and in.  The bark gets stripped off and they just stay there!

The beach isn't sandy, it is covered in river rocks.

One of the mountain rivers flowing into the ocean.

Mike playing on the beach!  He thinks it's sand!  Just kidding!

Today there was a high surf advisory on the Pacific coast of the Olympic Peninsula, so we went down to the ocean to check out the 14-17 foot waves!  Only a video can give this justice.....