The Hoh Rainforest borders the Hoh river, a glacially-fed body that winds its way westward from the heart of the Olympic mountains in Washington state. The trail follows the river to reach the glacier itself, but the journey is a long one. That's not to say you won't see fascinating things all along the way!
Rainforest
A big, bright, orange thing caught my eye as we rounded the fallen redwoods. A giant mass of mushrooms were growing over what remained of a tree that had splintered in half and fallen a long time ago. They stood in stark contrast to the otherwise shadowy green foliage that covered the rainforest floor. Just above us, a ray of light from the rising sun found its way through the canopy and began illuminating the fungi so that they seemingly glowed.
In a place where everything is wet, the fungi can grow to ridiculous proportions.
With a week's worth of supplies on our backs, we were ready to stay in the forest for a while. Our trail began deep in the Hoh Rainforest and went alongside the Hoh River, leading us up to one of the sources - the massive Blue Glacier at the foot of Mount Olympus. We had a little ways to go, though - the trail wound its way through the woods and up on the ridges for seventeen miles each way.
The forest is lush and green even in the driest times of the year.
Glacier
My feet slid out from underneath me suddenly, sending loose rocks and dust barreling down the ridge. I gripped the roots of a long-dead evergreen tightly to keep from going down with it, but getting my footing again was difficult. Maybe trying to go all the way along the ridge was not such a good idea after all... but I didn't see any other way to get close to the glacier below.
Fortunately, I was an expert on the monkey bars in elementary school, and I had not lost that skill just yet. I swung my legs up to reach firm ground and heaved like a llama in labor. Sharp branches scraped against my limbs and dust billowed into my face, but I eventually stood atop the ridge once again.
On my way up to the glacier. Don't worry, I already know how silly I look.
The ridge wound around some large boulders and led to a relatively flat area just above the glacier. The cliff fell off abruptly just beyond the boulders - I would need serious climbing gear to stand a chance of getting all the way down. I was going to have to settle for this view.
This is about as close as I could get to the glacier without a parachute.
Shapes in the Dark
Glacier water has a unique color. It looks milky but turquoise at the same time, sort of like a blue kiddie cereal that taints the milk it's sitting in. Though our campsite consisted of a cozy little corner of the pebble beach and came with a natural jacuzzi made of rock, I was reluctant to get in. The other thing about glacier water that you should know is that it is very, very, very, very cold.
You don't want to go all the way into this glacier runoff unless it's really really really hot out.
After a lot of screaming and squealing, I ran out of the river and set my clothes to dry next to the fire. Slight movement near the tent caught my eye before I turned around again, and I froze. In the dim light, I could just make out a pair of eyes glowing at me and a large shape against the spruce trunks. A smaller pair of eyes followed closely behind, then another. As they moved into the clearing near our fire we could finally make out the doe and her fawns creeping stealthily through our camp. And stealthy they were - they did not make a sound the entire time.
The deer here will sneak up to you, no problem. They must be quite used to human visitors.
Tempest
A loud crash erupted just behind me as I took a bite of my rehydrated lasagna. I turned around slowly to find what amounted to a felled tree just behind me, still swaying from the impact and the heavy wind. I glanced upwards to make sure no other trees were planning on landing on my head and got ready to leap if I needed to. It might be time to move along.
Sunlight pours in through the rainforest canopy. Trees and branches swayed frighteningly whenever a gust blew.
We quickly packed our lunch gear and proceeded down the trail, hoping the winds would die down a bit further down the river. I cleared a few trees from the path and stopped in my tracks whenever the wind blew again - I needed to keep my eyes up to see if any large branches were coming my way. Crashing continued to our left and right, and a large tree fell just in front of us along the trail, forcing us to climb over. The winds howled through the swaying branches, making it difficult to hear each other even two meters away. We couldn't stop, though; at least not without finding a safer place.
Our final campsite featured very short, unlikely-to-fall-on-our-head trees.
Eventually, we reached our campsite - a pebble beach surrounded by two-meter tall trees. They swayed a bit but wouldn't cause too much damage even if they fell over, so this would be our safe spot. With the tent up we finally had a respite from the heavy winds, and they gradually died down in the evening. Emerging from our tents, we eyed the milky white water flowing nearby. A quick bath sounded great, if only to wipe the sweat off our foreheads, but then again I knew it would freeze me to my soul...
A furry woodland critter bids us farewell along the trail.
