Exploring the OP

One rainy afternoon I arrived in Port Townsend. Across the Puget Sound just west of Seattle, it was established as a defensive point to protect the entrance to Puget Sound. It tuned into a seaside stop-over for all manner of port traffic. It is rich in history and stories of shipwrecks, broken hearts and failed ventures. Architecture-wise, it reminds me of Cape Hatteras, NC with a little bit of the Dayton, OH commercial district thrown-in.

I used the town exactly as it was designed - to be my home-base for my expedition to explore the Olympic Peninsula. The peninsula is home to the giant Olympic National Park. The park is famous for Mount Olympus, the Hoh temperate rain forest plus werewolves and vampires - or rather, famous films about werewolves and vampires.

I set off on the first morning for Mt Olympus. But, like most Greeks

who seek Olympus, I was quickly disappointed. There was a big fire at the visitor center in early May and so no access allowed to the area. I had to make do with some hiking at tree line and some gambling in the local casino.

Next day I made the LONG drive to Hoh rain forest on the west side of the Olympic Peninsula. You can't quite see Japan from the shore, but you know that it is just outside your visibility. You've gone so far west it has become east. They get over 14 feet of rainfall there every year, plus the prevalent fog and mist contributes the equivalent of another 30 inches of rain; so lush doesn't begin to describe it.

Everything was covered in ferns and moss and lichens. Layer upon layer of lush green material. Draped over anything that would hold it - trees, fence posts, rocks. Everything.

From Hoh I headed for Rialto Beach, famous for the scenes in the Twighlight movie they shot there. The beach was rugged, carved from the cliffs around it. The fallen trees washed ashore must have weighed thousands of pounds, but the water pushed them around like toothpicks.

I was impressed with the mammoth scale and deep wildness of the Olympic Peninsula - it seems so close to Seattle, I thought it'd be more suburban. Nope, it was wild and haunting - the perfect place for vampires and werewolves to have their battles in private.