Autumn on the Olympic Peninsula

The Olympic Peninsula contains a top-notch national park with a variety of beautiful vistas. From Hurricane Ridge, you can take in glittering mountaintop glaciers and turquoise bays. On the western side, there are unusual beaches and rainforests. What you will not see is civilization. West of Port Angeles, dining and shopping options are few.

Quick Tips:

To be well-located, stay in Port Angeles. This small town has some nice restaurants, all the usual stores to pick up last minute supplies, and tons of bed and breakfasts. It is also the place to pick up ferries to British Columbia.

Best Way To Get Around:

There is no public transportation to speak of and the roads are long on the Olympic Peninsula. I believe most visitors would be best served by renting a car. We rented a hybrid and didn't even use a tank of gas!

The only other transportation is the ferries. You can use the ferries to reach nearby islands, the mainland, and British Columbia. We took the ferry to Whidbey Island and drove back to Seattle from there.

This was my first time staying at a true bed-and-breakfast. Previously, I had been concerned about not getting along with the other guests or, worse, the owners. In my imagination, we'd all eat breakfast together and somehow we'd all get into an argument. That would never happen in real life, right?

So, I looked up bed-and-breakfasts on the OP and saw that BJ's Garden Gate was highly rated. I was warmed by BJ's friendly Texas voice on the phone and the ease of dealing with her for reservations. When we arrived on our first day, she welcomed us to the house and gave us the rules. Yes, you have a hot tub in your room, but you cannot use it after 9pm. No eating in your room either, she told us, noting we had brought a bottle of wine. If you want to take breakfast to go, she'd put together a take-along bag for us. She also gave us tips on where to go the next day.

The rooms were decorated in an anachronistic combination of French, Victorian, and country designs. To give an example, heavy dark furniture adorned the room alongside flowery bedspreads and lacy doilies, and the bathroom had a straw hat as a decoration. There was indeed a lovely window with a view of the ocean.

The rest of the property was equally lovely, with a charming if not-so-sophisticated garden complete with garden gnomes. Snobbishness aside, the garden would make anyone smile.

The to-go breakfast was substantial and lasted us for the whole day, with fruit, yogurt, muffins, juice, and coffee. The next day we experienced the gourmet five-course breakfast. The five courses consisted of the coffee course, the orange juice course, and the French toast course. The breakfast was tasty and quite filling. Unfortunately, it was during breakfast when our conversation revealed something about our hostess that I feel I must reveal. In a conversation about America, she revealed to us that the slaves should feel lucky that they were brought here for free when most people's ancestors had to pay to come to this wonderful country. At another point, I do believe she used the n-word, although I've since blocked out the context. We are a lesbian couple, and she never said anything about that. I don't know if her own politeness kept her comments back. Anyway, it became very uncomfortable, and we were glad to leave.

In summary, it's a nice bed-and-breakfast. Personally, I have my reservations in recommending the place because of her comments.

Bella Italia served up some of the best food we had on the peninsula. It felt like an oasis of culture after spending a day in the wilderness. First Lady Bush enjoys eating here when she is in town, but I didn't let my politics interfere with my choice of cuisine. The restaurant was truly fantastic and was the only place with a long wait to get inside.

This is a small restaurant, and if you can't get a seat, you may want to dine at the bar. Plenty of regulars were there, and we joined them. The full menu is available at the bar, and you also get to enjoy a full spectrum of wines. This restaurant carries both Italian and local wines, as there are several wineries on the peninsula. In fact, I found the restaurant because it was recommended by the local wine guide.

I ordered the smoked salmon ravioli, and my partner ordered a delicious salmon on fettuccine. Salmon on the west coast is absolutely heavenly, converting me from a salmon-hater to a salmon-lover. The food here was very well prepared and served hot. We also had an amazing Caesar salad. The menu appears to change seasonally, but you can check it online here.

Bella Italia does a good job of evoking Italy. This restaurant, in the heart of the northwest US, looks like it could have been in Venice itself. It is small, dark, and cozy, like so many restaurants found in Boston’s North End.

The poor folks in Fork... They must hate Mexican food. Their only Mexican restaurant is one of the worst I have ever been to. I should have realized something was up when we were the ONLY visitors to the restaurant. Well, their chips and salsa were edible, only a little soggy. I can’t even remember what I ordered here. It was something with a tortilla and cheese and some kind of chicken. What is the Spanish word for abomination? Plaza Jalisco is an affront to Mexican food everywhere. I have had better Mexican food in New Hampshire, for goodness sake.

One amusement came of our visit here. Whilst dining, the songs of the mariachis were suddenly drowned out by the sounds of Guns and Roses blaring from the kitchen. There is nothing like a good Welcome to the Jungle-mariachi remix!

When in Forks, eat as the locals do. We saw NO locals at Plaza Jalisco (which is also the winner of Best Mexican in Forks – it obviously has no competition). There was a diner nearby. I guess good old American food might have been a better bet when in a logging town in the far reaches of the Olympic Peninsula.

Dupuis's website

Dupuis's is your typical steak and seafood place, with a specialty in Dungeness crab. My partner had the crab, while I ordered the cedar-planked salmon. I'm sure the crab was great, but I loved this salmon. Salmon on the West Coast is just so delish. Dupuis also had a nice wine selection, with some local wines to enjoy.

I was really surprised at how good this restaurant was. It is a credit to the seafood in Washington that a restaurant that is decorated with chintzy flower vases, knickknacks, and lacy curtains could taste so good. The food was a bit pricy, and outside of the seafood, was nothing to write home about. However, the amazing salmon we had here blew us away.

You’d hardly notice the place down the street on busy highway 101 just outside Port Angeles’ downtown. It’s unassuming and we really were not expecting much. We certainly weren’t expecting an $80 a dinner. So, be warned – it’s pricy. I guess, if it wasn’t this pricy, I’d be able to give it a better review. In my hometown, I’d expect a little more style and presentation for that kind of money. The food did, however, warrant some praise.

Only a 20-minute drive from Port Angeles, Hurricane Ridge is a popular spot for hiking. Everyone, from seniors to small children, can handle the paved paths around the ridge, and more ambitious hikers can tackle longer trails that gain a lot of elevation and afford great views.

The trails around the visitor center do not take a long time to cover, but they do offer some spectacular views of the San Juan De Fuca Bay and the ridge. It was on one of the popular loop trails that we saw the deer. You can also see the primitive ski equipment, which we are told is still operational.

One had to drive to get the longer trailhead. There is another parking lot here. We hiked this trail for a while, getting amazing views of the glaciers, spotting small forest animals, and seeing other hikers of all shapes and sizes. The climbs can be quite strenuous here.

You are pretty much guaranteed to see a deer, passing almost close enough to touch it. Sometimes they are thick up here, but when I visited, I only saw one lone doe . . . and heard dozens of clicks as we all tried to capture her on camera. The deer seem to be completely unafraid of humans.

This is a popular place, easily accessible, well-known, and good for nature lovers of all ages and abilities. On this sparsely populated peninsula, Hurricane Ridge may hold most of the visitors at any one time. After all, it is right off the highway closest to a major town. You won't find solitude here, but you will find beauty and nature, which rarely accompany such popularity.

Rialto Beach. The name echoes a famous bridge in Venice, and like it, it can be a hauntingly beautiful sight. Rialto Beach features the sea-stacks that are common to this part of the world. These ghostly rock piles thrust out of the sea, black against the overcast sky. There is a sense of danger here, with the signs warning of tsunamis and drownings. Yes, the whole beach evidences the signs of past tsunamis (Japanese for giant tidal waves), with giant trees brought low by the ocean laying gutted on the beach. The beach itself consists of several layers. Closest to the water, there is black sand. This gives way to ever-larger pebbles and rocks. Then driftwood and fallen trees butt up against a living forest.

On our first visit, it was stormy. We were the only ones on the beach, and we stayed out for as long as we could stand it before running for cover. Later that day, the sky had cleared, and we saw Rialto's other face, a golden-lit landscape that was far less sinister. The balmy weather led us to walk down the beach to Hole-in-the-Wall, a rock formation that forms a donut near the sea. At times people can get trapped on these rock outcroppings, so we kept our eye on the incoming tide at all times. When it seemed as if the tide was coming in quickly, we bid the beach farewell.

Entrance to Rialto Beach is free, and it is the most easily accessible of this area's beaches.

Getting There
Take Highway 101 (the only highway) south from Forks, Washington. This is the last place to get lunch for a while by the way.

Count on driving for a long time over a bumpy gravel road. Although the distance appears short on a map, the road seems interminable at the speed you must travel at.

Hours
Although open daily all summer long, the visitor center is only open from 9am to 4pm on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in the fall and winter seasons. This is important to know if you need trail maps or use of the restrooms here.
Hoh Rainforest

Welcome to the Hoh Rainforest. This part of the world has some of the only temperate rainforests, and if you haven't seen one before, prepare to be amazed. I certainly was. Here I am in cool, wet weather, and I'm surrounded by a lush abundance of green plants. If the plants were recognizably temperate, I would have thought I was in Central America or Southeast Asia.

The Hoh Rainforest has a visitor center where you can pick up maps of the trail. There are two trails, a popular one with lots of educational signs and activities and a more solitary hike that brings you through different levels of the rainforest and to the river. The short, main trail was very crowded, with many tourists stopping to take pictures at every new vision. I was certainly one of them! The plants here are huge, even the ferns are bigger than your average human. Moss hangs from giant trees. Logs extend for what seems like a mile. From the signs, you can learn all about the ecosystem. Unfortunately, some people are very pushy and want to have the whole path to themselves. That's what you get for visiting a national park in the summertime I guess.

I also enjoyed the other trail, which had less informational sign postings, but gave the visitor a chance to apply their previously learned knowledge at their leisure.

This park is easy to visit in a few hours. I actually wished the trails were longer. It seemed, as in most places within the national park, that you had a choice of easy, quick hikes or extremely long hikes, with nothing in between. It was also cold and rainy (yes, in the rainforest, rainy). Due to the unusually wet weather that year, we did get to see lush greenery in the forest that most summer visitors miss. At the same time, it was less comfortable to be in one's own skin when you are soaked to the bone.