Sunday September 12, Port Angeles, WA

150 miles

Somehow this north western corner of Washington reminds us a lot of NZ….including the rain! Light rain fell all night, hard to hear over the roar of the waves crashing on the beach below us. And this morning it was still falling, the beautiful beach quite grey.
We made a slow start hoping for a clearing but it just kept falling. We had heard about a beautiful beach just north, Ruby Beach and had planned a stop, but just too wet. Took a quick look, there were wonderful rock forms out to see and a river flowing into the surf, evidently a very photographed place.. but I missed out!
I was also very keen to drive up to the Hoh Rain forest but missed on that too.
We stopped in the town of Forks and there was an event happening that I had no idea of, maybe I am too old, or maybe it is just American. It was honoring the author of the Twilight books on Bella’s birthday who evidently is the heroine of these books, that presumably were written in this area. There were shops selling promo gear and Twilight bus tours…and there was going to be a celebration cutting of the cake. Lots of young girls were around town taking photos…maybe I need to find out some more about all this.

With the rain falling we stopped for a lunch break in a little restaurant in town before continuing on. The drive was really nice and surprised to see quite a few red leaves appearing. We took the scenic route to the north coast over very windy roads, and had planned to drive right out to the most western point of the states, but flagged that with the weather.
Arrived in Port Angeles late afternoon and gave Ruakiwi a carwash…well needed. Decided to park in Walmart for the night.