Olympic National Park. Hurricane Ridge

We decided to explore Olympic National Park more thoroughly. On the way, we stopped in Port Gamble for coffee. The town is very small - just one and a half streets, but everything is very nicely decorated, and you can have breakfast near the cliff overlooking the bay.

Our first stop was Hurricane Ridge (an hour by ferry and two by car). At the very top, there is a ski resort, and in the summer, you can take a walk on the alpine meadows. On the way up, there are several viewpoints, and from the first one, you can see the Canadian shores, which are inaccessible from the spring. Closer to the top, fawns are already walking along the road.

When you get out of the car in the uppermost parking lot, you can hardly believe your eyes. How can it be so beautiful? Where do all these snow-capped peaks come from? The highest point of the Olympic Mountains is Olympus, which is about 2400 meters high and is named after a peak in Greece. Despite its small height, due to powerful winter snowfalls (which are formed because the mountains retain moisture from the ocean), there are several large glaciers on the summit, the largest of which is the Blue Glacier, although it has been shrinking in recent years...

There is a network of trails on the ridge that you can walk on. If you stand next to the trail, passing rangers will ask you to walk only on the designated paths. After walking on one of them, you can come out on the opposite slope. From there, the view is slightly different - almost no snow-capped peaks, but a direct view of the shores of Vancouver Island. The traces of forest fires are visible on the nearest slopes, but nature is slowly recovering.

And between the parking lot and the trail where people walk, deer and groundhogs hang out. They don't care about people at all, they chew grass and bask in the sun.

Our YouTube video

Happy visiting Olympic National Park! :v: