Day 33, Thursday April 2nd: Olympic NP

On Thursday when we got up it looked like the weather was improving, but it was just a tease.  

We left the Willapa Brewery around 09:30, this seems to be our regular time for departure.  I did take some extra time to put some more bailing wire on the Serenity tailpipe, she is good for another 5000 miles 😊.

Fork, WA

The rain picked up and it just hung about 45F. Despite the rain, as we drove up the coast, the views still compelled us to pull over and take it in, although we did not linger. 

We entered Olympic National Park on 101 North from the West side. Much of the park is seasonal, and not everything is open so we set our sights on the only Visitor Center open this time of year, Port Angeles Visitor Center. 

Big Cedar

Since we had just visited 'Big Tree' in the Redwood NP, when we saw the sign for 'Big Cedar Tree', we had to pull in and check it out. 

Unfortunately, Big Cedar is pretty dead and falling down. 

Fortunately, there was a short hike that goes into the forest with some pretty impressive Cedar Trees. We had no idea that Cedar Trees could grow so large.  

The root structure of some of these trees is fascinating. 

The road into Big Cedar is not long but has some big pot holes.  As we were leaving there was a confluence of events that resulted in a severely bent door step on the Serenity. 

-When we got back in the Serenity and started it, the door step did not retract automagically like it should. We had this happen early in our trip, but lately it was consistently working, so we stopped making a point to check it...our bad.

-The road is poorly maintained, lots of pot holes and fallen trees barely pushed out of the road. 

-A Tesla driver that we met coming the other way, would not yield the road even though we were clearly negotiating large potholes and a fallen tree on the right. 

- I should have just stopped and yelled at the Tesla driver, but as I was squeezing between the Tesla and the fallen log, we felt something grab.  I got out of the Serenity and found the step was deployed and folded over the log.  Crap!

Serenity Step

The damage was done and it was not the first time for this poor step, it was severely bent on our 2024 trip in Arizona, so it was not all that healthy to begin with. 

In the end it is always the Pilot's fault...my bad.

We did not make any further sightseeing stops, but I did stop at a hardware store for a large rubber hammer. We arrived at the visitor center about 15:30 where the ranger explained that most of the hiking around the visitor center is closed and we will need to backtrack to the west if we want to do any hikes. We are thinking about it. 

We browsed the visitor center displays, June finally saw an Elk, and watched the movie. 

At least the Heart O' the Hills campground was open and only 5 miles up the road. We had no trouble finding a campsite. I spent the next 2 hours working on the step. Even with the help of one of the other campers, we could not budge the bent step back into place. Luckily I brought my M18 Chainsaw and was able to cut some logs the right length so I could use my Serenity hydraulic jack wedged against the rear tires to push the step back in place while I beat on it with the big hammer.  It is functional again, but will take some tuning when I get home. Jaquish ingenuity. :)

We have had better days but in the end, all is good. Tomorrow is Friday, we are unsure if we will do some hiking or just proceed to cousin Todd's place which is about 100 miles away in Oak Harbor, WA on Whidbey Island.