Olympic Peninsula – North Coast (part 1)

Before getting into my next stop I wanted to mention that I have now been full timing for more than a year.  Actually 16 months!  I’ve learned quite a bit. 

I’m putting more miles on my car than I thought I would.  But I don’t mind traveling an hour or so from my camp site.  Some people prefer to move their RV, but if I want to just visit the area for a day and I’m in an area/park that I like I prefer just to drive.  Besides many times it’s easier and more fun to drive the Honda CRV rather than the motorhome towing the car. 

I always thought that I would mix private RV parks with national/state/county parks and that is the case.  In Oregon and Washington I’ve done more private parks as most of the government parks are under trees and when it’s cool and/or rainy I prefer an open spot. 

I had expected to have a satellite system by now.  I like my TV, but since I’m in private parks more than 50% of the time I typically have cable.  When there is no cable, I can usually get something over the air.  Only a few times have I had nothing. 

Well, back to my travels.  I had read about a Clallum county park that sounded very interesting.  Salt Creek recreation park is a great place just west of Port Angeles, WA.  They have 2 different areas for camping.  One is non-hookup, under trees and has more private sites.  The other area has full hookups for RVs, is in the open and the sites are close together.  But the view is worth it!

That’s my RV in the third row from the water.  The water is the Strait of Juan De Fuca.  I could see Vancouver Island, Canada just across the water.  Actually my cell phone was picking up a Canadian tower, so I only used it once from the campground as I didn’t want to pay a roaming charge.   The rows of RVs were tiered so while I was in the third row I looked over the RVs in front of me – I loved it. In fact I stayed here for 5 days and then left for a week and a half and then came back for 5 more days.  I watched cruise ships, fishing boats, barges and Coast Guard (both US and Canadian) boats go up and down the Strait. 

While I was using the park as a base camp for traveling around the area, the park was a destination in itself.  There were a couple of trails, tide pools, water…

The 2 pictures below are of the beach at the park.  The first is at high tide and the second at low tide. 

The park is known for having great tide pools.  Below is one of the pools at low tide.  I saw the largest sea star (star fish) that I have ever seen.  It is the one on the left side of the pool, out of the water.  Below it was a huge Green Anemone. (see second picture).  This particular day was an extremely low tide so there were more people out looking that day.

Above is a blood star.  Some of them were orange, while others were red. 

One of the reasons that I love this park is there was a spot that I liked to sit and just watch the water.

 

My travels in the area will be in the next blog.