La Push, Olympic National Park, Washington, USA. 2nd November 2018.
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This morning I decided to drive from La Push to Rialto Beach. That’s only a couple of hundred metres and should not have taken long except that I didn’t think to order a rental car that had the capacity to drive on water. The Quillayute River is between La Push and Rialto Beach. So I had to take the road, which takes about twenty minutes.
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Temperate rainforest.
The time stamp on these first images indicates they were taken on the morning of the drive to Rialto Beach. So maybe I did encounter a patch of rainforest on the way but I think this is unlikely. Some of the following images were probably taken the day before in Hoh Rainforest.
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I don’t recall being seized by an urge to sample this mushroom to determine whether it was hallucinogenic, fatally poisonous or merely edible.
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The hanging gardens as I babble on.
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A river view and it is raining.
I think it’s probably Hoh river from the day before but if it’s on the drive to Rialto Beach, it is the Quillayute River.
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The sombre beauty of a rainy day.
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Grey ghosts of the forest.
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A cascade in a damp environ.
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A fern by the water.
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Autumn at a rapids.
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Logs probably carried by a flood and stuck in place.
(This and previous images are probably from Hoh Rainforest).
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Now we are definitely close to Rialto Beach, both by the timestamp and the drift logs plentiful on this coast.
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Rialto Beach.
If there is a brochure for this place, it would show a bright sunny day with blue sky and not be nearly as evocative.
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Rialto Beach with drift logs.
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Rialto Beach with more drift logs.
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The person on the right has a rare art deco umbrella. I haven’t been able to find one online and it’s probably very expensive.
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Fog and rain and Little James Island.
You can access the island at low tide but trying to climb to the top is “not recommended”.
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La Push Marina with James Island (left) and Little James Island (right) in the background.
I’ve driven back and we are now at La Push, on the other side of the river, over an hour and a half later, and it seems the weather has cleared.
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The top of Little James Island.
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A sea stack near James Island. I don’t know whether it has a name.
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Looking across the mouth of the Quillayute River.
Man-made tidal barrier in the foreground, then the edge of Little James Island and Cake Rock in the distance, about four kilometres away.
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Gulls on the mouth of the Quillayute River.
There appear to be two types of gulls here, but too far away to identify. The log shows up on Google Earth, so perhaps it’s lying on a sandbank.
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The birds on the log again. In the background, an island between Little James Island and James Island.
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First Beach, La Push, and gulls taking off as I walk to close to them. James Island in the background.
James Island is actually horse-shoe-shaped, opening out to the sea. It would be a compelling place to visit if access is feasible. It has a beach to land on, a clear area at the top and probably easy access to the internal beach, but it may or may not be feasible to climb up there.
There is a semicircular object at front middle-right on the beach. My theory is that it is not a natural rock formation.
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