Wander Back: Seattle

After spending so much time in rural areas and small towns, being in a big city was quite a change. Everything was so tall!

I woke up Wednesday much earlier than I’d hoped and went up to the roof deck to have coffee and watch the view. I took advantage of the roof deck and the coffee machine up there quite a bit over my stay at MJ’s parents house. After coffee, I went to the grocery store and got some basics to have on hand for the next few days.

I cooked up French toast for MJ and I and then she was off to start getting ready for her flight out and the wedding she was flying out to and I hung around for a bit, but also otherwise spent the day doing errands. It was fun walking around the city. Pretty much everything I needed to do was within a half mile of MJ’s parents’ apartment. I even got Szechuan food for lunch, which was an excellent treat.

MJ and I had one errand in common - shipping our camping gear out. I don’t need mine for the rest of my journey, so shedding the weight and bulk simplifies my travel. It turns out it all weighed 14 lbs.

MJ then headed off to the airport by way of a friend’s house and I had a quiet evening and was early to bed. It was so nice just hanging out in the apartment and having some quiet time after all of the adrenaline of hitting the coast.

Thursday was a tourist day. I took the ferry out to Bainbridge Island and went to the art and history museums there and stopped at their famous iced creamery place (pretty good!). I had accidentally ended up walking down 36 flights of stairs the day before (I had wanted to go down one, but it turned out that once I was in the stairwell, the only exit was all the way down…) so I was hobbling around a bit. It was fun to see the island, but I was mostly in it for the ferry rides to be honest. The views of the city and the sound were fantastic.

On my way back from the ferry, I swung by the library, which MJ had said was one of the best in the world. It was indeed quite impressive (though Missoula’s still has my top spot). It’s a modern building with lots of open air and light and spaces to hang out. It also had an escalator up to an exit on the other side of the block, which saved a hill walk and was very appreciated by my sore legs.

Friday was a lazy day. I spent the morning sleeping in and lounging around and then the early afternoon up on the roof deck writing post cards. I then caught a bus out to Bellevue so Martin could pick me up at the same time he picked up his son, Jake, from summer camp.

I spent the evening hanging out with Martin, Jake, and Martin’s wife Shan Shan. Martin cooked up a delicious dinner with lots of veggies, which was so nice after lots of simpler meals on the road. Martin and I did a bit of planning for our adventure the next day and went to bed early.

My alarm went off at 2am and I wandered down to have a quick bite and fill up a mug of coffee for the road and then Martin and I were off. We had a grand plan to tour Olympic National Park in one day. It’s about 4-6 hours away depending on where in the park, so we were on the road early so we could get to Shi Shi Beach near sunrise and low tide. I later learned, that while a variant of this Olympics-in-a-day tour is his go to tourist adventure, I’m the first person who’s been crazy enough to agree to leave at 2:30 in the morning 🤣.

We had an almost two mile walk through the woods to get to the beach. We went down a big slope and then through some tall grass and a huge beach with jagged, knife-like rocks in front of us. Attached to the rocks were lots of mussels, anemones, and star fish. It was so cool! We walked almost three miles down the beach to these huge rocks creating arch formations. Being on a sandy beach on the open ocean for the first time since leaving Little Compton felt a bit like home, even though the scenery was so different.

After Shi Shi, we went to Cape Flattery, which claims to be the most north West Point in the continental US (though I’m not sure how you define north west-est…). It was a short hike down to the cliffs overlooking the water. The shore was dotted with sea caves and the coves were full of huge kelp.

From Shi Shi, we had a couple hour drive to the Hoh Rainforest. Unfortunately, there was a line to get into the parking lot at the trailhead there. We eventually got in and hiked the Hall of Mosses. It was full of huge, moss covered trees. Given this is the dry time of year, the forest wasn’t super wet. It was still quite lush, but Martin says it’s usually way more lush. I bet it’s truly magical when that’s the case.

We had made good time up to this point, so we picked up a couple cups of coffee and went to Hurricane Hill. It was a winding drive up to the overlook at the ridge and on to the trailhead. The road is the highest in Washington (or at least it’s up there). I was definitely hurting a bit at this point (blisters and some stiffness), but the views were just amazing, so onward we went. At one point Martin said we were a third of the way up the trail, which was definitely a lie. It was quite a climb at the end, but the trail was all paved, so all in not too bad. We made it to the top of the hill, which was bald, so had just amazing 360 views. Part of the 360 was just clouds, so more like 270 in practice. We made it back down just as the sun was setting, making for a dramatic ride back down the mountain.

Martin dropped me off in Seattle by way of the Bainbridge Island ferry. Seeing the skyline lit up at night was quite the sight. I made it back to the apartment at 11:30pm - our adventure clocked in at 21 hours and about 15 miles of hiking. I was pooped, but had to do a bit of cleaning before bed to prepare for leaving in the morning.

I cleaned and packed in the morning. Packing was so simple with so much less stuff. I biked through the city to the train station and am now en route to San Jose, CA.