2022 07 Washington State Day Nine, Ten and Eleven

Saturday, July 16, 2022

We were up in time for our last elegant breakfast at the Old Consulate. After packing up, right down the hill from our place we found a UPS store that would ship the arts, antiques and clothing that we bought on the trip.

It is a 3 and ½ hour trip from Port Townsend to Amanda Park where we are sleeping tonight. Maybe our best bet would have been to stay in Port Townsend one more night as we missed seeing a number of cool things. But because the timing of our reservation meant we could not, it was on to Lake Quinault.

Appropriately, we are staying at the Lake Quinault Inn which is a little motel in the woods and a kind of shock after staying in the elegant Victorian. Once checked in, we took a ten minute drive back up Hwy. 101 to the Quinault National Recreation area. 

Here we had another of our “tourist” experiences as the line to check in at the desk was extensive. All we wanted to do at 4:00 PM was get a dinner reservation in the Lodge and it was a good thing we did. By the time we got to the front of the line our earliest sitting for dinner was 8:30 PM.

Denice and I went for a couple hour hike on the trail system. W e headed out from the Ranger Station out to Cascade Falls. 

Then we went on a Cedar Bog loop. The next part was the Rain Forest Nature Trail. After that we crossed the highway and took the waterfront trail back to the Lodge.

After killing an hour or so with a glass of wine, we had a marvelous dinner in the Lake Quinault Lodge. It was truly worth the wait. 

Sunday, July 17, 2022

Because it is so cool, we decided to drive back to the Lake Quinault Lodge for breakfast. They open at 7:30 AM and by being an early arrival, we got a window seat overlooking the lake with a busy hummingbird feeder right in front of us. 

The drive from Amanda City to Bremerton is 2.5 hrs. so we were off after breakfast. We made a stop in Aberdeen to attend a small town fair.

Our goal is to meet Denice’s twin brother Dennis at the Elandan Gardens Ltd. in Bremerton.

The gardens are a bonsai farm run by Dan Robinson. Robinson leased the land for the farm from the city of Bremerton because it had been a garbage dump for years. By building his farm on top of that, he has resurrected the landscape and create a world class collection of bonsai to view. He is many thing: a bonsai master, cultivator, artist, environmentalist and hippie. We had a chance to talk with him as he gave one of his creations a haircut and it was a life lesson. Would that we all could find a passion and devote our life to that plus be a good guardian of the Earth.

Dennis’ next suggestion as a visit to the Tacoma Glass Museum.

The inside Chihuly

We then took a walk on the Chihuly Bridge which has a impressive if unusually place set of his work.

The outside Chihuly

Dennis, Denice and I shared one last meal at Social Bar and Grill before saying our goodbyes.

We returned our rental car to the airport with 776 miles on the odometer—all driven by Denice. This is a change for us and usually I do all the driving. However, I really enjoyed my vacation as a passenger because I saw more than I would behind the wheel.

We rode the shuttle over to our last stay on the trip, La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Seattle Sea-Tac Airport.

Monday, July 18, 2022

Today is a travel day. After shuttling back to the airport, we are flying out on Sun Country to Minneapolis at 9:10 AM (Western). 

Our 2 and ½ flight gets us to Minneapolis at 1:30 PM (Central). Our flight back to O’Hare takes off at 4:30 PM and arrive in Chicago at 6:00 PM. Denice’s sister Marijeanne is nice enough to pick us up and drive us home by 8:30 PM.

I would have to say that the Olympic Peninsula proved to be more than we could do in one trip this length. It was some of the most beautiful scenery we have ever seen and each day proved to be the restful nature trip we were looking for despite going during one of the busiest times of the year.

May be time is the number one take away from this experience as we stood next to living organisms who were older than written records could reveal. It was a great time and I would return to this part of the world to see what I missed.