From the main Visitor’s Center in Port Angeles its a winding 17 mile drive to the top of Hurricane Ridge. At sea level the weather today is sketchy. A little sun. A little rain. A little cloudiness. Slight breeze off the surrounding waters of the peninsula. At ~5200 ft it changes. As you can see. Or not.

I took the picture from the veranda of the visitor center on top the ridge. There’s an enclosed observation area but I didn’t want to shoot through the glass. In reality I suspect it makes not much difference in terms of what’s visible.

A lot of wind up here. No sun lately. Angled rain. Cuts right through you. And yet the Center (which is closed for the season) has filled with twenty or more people in the past few minutes all spreading picnics on the tables in the main room. I drove several thousand miles to not see this view today. Where they’re coming from God only knows.

I hadn’t expected to even glimpse wildlife up here this afternoon but as I sit here writing there is a very persistent hawk circling the area pictured looking for his picnic. I don’t think I want to be reincarnated as a hawk, at least not in this territory.

A large portion of this park is rain forest, something I got a first hand view of initially in Cascades. I’m looking forward to exploring more here. I think I’m going to hang for a few days. Most of the campgrounds are open – and not crowded – but it appears we’re going to get a lot of rain through about Saturday. There are plenty of roofed places to stay as an alternative to the tent. Lacking an illusionary reaction from anything I might ingest I’m going for dry with an Internet connection.

For now I’m going to descend in search of greater visibility. Charles would love it up here. Ruth would be looking for a club to bludgeon me with.