Gems Along the Canal

A perfect Sequim day, sunny with big puffy clouds. Down 101 and soon we entered the Hood Canal Watershed. This whole area is loaded with recreation opportunities beaches, boating, fishing, hiking - definitely something for everyone. Passing through Quilcene a gas station, oyster store and liquor store makes up the hamlet. We stopped for breakfast at Loggers Landing and sat right next to the window with hummingbird feeders where we watched the Anna come and go. Continuing on, the clouds have risen above the mountains and we can see the snow in the Olympic National Forest as we climb over hills and pass Mt Walker. Rolling down a grade we round a curve to an "Ah" view - our first of the Hood Canal.

The Hood Canal is not really a canal but a 63 mile long, 600-foot deep body of calm water that is a saltwater fjord carved by glaciers. This region is well known for it's clams and oysters. We crossed the sparkly Dosewallips River with summer homes and docks lining the water way and watched people clamming in the mud flats. We passed through little villages with great names like Duckbush, Hamma Hamma, Lillawarp, and Hoodsport. This is a place where even the old time drive-in movie theatres are still alive on weekends!

We turned onto State Route 108 leading through the lush Chehalis River Valley and then turned onto Rte 8W heading back towards Aberdeen. We just completed the whole Olympic loop and it was fabulous!

We arrived in Elma, Washington and found the Travel Inn Park. This is a great little park and has fairly new facilities. This is our staging point to get ready for the ferry and heading to Alaska. The owner gave us storage space and we unpacked the car and took off the cartop carrier. Thank goodness for the storage now we don't have to leave our stuff outdoors.

We went to check out downtown Elma. First impression is a nice little town with cute older homes, great gardens and a new high school. They've refurbished a lot of the older stores and it offers all the necessary basics - groceries, coffee shop, and pizza. Naturally there's a chineese restaurant and we had dinner there. The other thing we noticed is there are a lot of churches. We came to one intersection where there was a church on each corner.

Back at camp we watched TV and called it a day.