Neah Bay and Forks

Go west they said so we did. Neah Bay is the most westerly point in mainland USA and part of the Makaw tribal reservation. The last part of the drive there was alongside the Juan de Fuca channel and we caught glimpses of eroding stacs, some surrounded by kelp forests. The road quality deteriorated dramatically when we entered the Makaw tribal lands and this set the tone for part of what we saw. The usual decaying single wide manufactured homes still flying Christmas lights. Scrap pickup trucks filled with trash and derelict boats sitting on trailers with flat or missing tyres filled the drive ways.

Not everywhere was like this however. The museum was the best insight into north west coastal tribal life we have seen. The wealth of artefacts on display is due to a mudslide which had covered a longhouse 500 years ago and the heavy clay had preserved the house and contents. The displays include a reconstruction of the longhouse with the racks of smoked fish in the roof, cedar mats for separating the areas, raised benches for sleeping and sitting plus several fire pits. Bows and arrows in different stages of manufacture were found as well as part of a fishing net. This turned out to be important in the tribes fight to regain control over their fishing rights. The treaty signed by chief Seattle allowed them to fish as they had done in the past. As they had had a net in the past they won the right to fish with nets today. There was a beautifully made whaling canoe with all its bladders and the harpoon to kill the whale. They actually killed a whale in 1969 using the traditional methods.

The "Nantucket sleigh ride" behind the harpooned whale





The marina was filled with native owned fishing or crabbing boats and was well maintained although we did not see much evidence of landings and there was no fish market as far as we could see.

We spent the night in a campsite on the beach lulled to sleep by the sound of the surf. This beach is the most westerly beach in mainland USA. Our morning walk on the beach was a brief one as the rain had made the sand heavy and the low clouds promised more. They measure the annual rainfall here in feet not inches.

We moved south to Forks next day lured by the promise of a free tour of a sawmill and logging site. The tour started well as the driver negotiated the back streets of Forks and found 40 or so elk grazing in a field by the road. One cow was separate from the rest and our guide, a retired logger, explained that she was probably looking for a quiet spot to drop her calf. He also showed that although he might have retired some years ago from logging he was still an active hunter, regailing us with the different seasons and limits for hunting elk, deer, black bear and mountain lions with bows, black powder as well as modern rifles. I for one one wonder if many animals linger on with arrows stuck in them. I can not believe that the average hunter will track a wounded elk through the woods on foot. No road for the ATV to be found here.

The sawmill was a revelation, clean and well run with up to date machinery some of which was computer controlled. We met a worker stacking 4x2s by hand on to a forklift who had 36 years with Allen logging and he was not unusual. However by UK standards the plant was woefully lacking in safety guards. Giant exposed chains ran back and forward everywhere moving the timber. One machine which grabbed the logs and chiselled the bark of with a set of giant teeth driven by a large flywheel would from time to time hit a snag or split log and the log would come apart with 15 foot long sections being escaping sideways to land like match sticks on the ground. No safety fence, no warning notice, just the common sense of the workers to steer clear of this area when the debarker was running.

As the housing market is depressed in the USA at the moment the price of lumber is down so the mill was not running flat out however the canny owner was stockpiling logs at low prices in anticipation of better days to come.

The logging sites were up a side road and we drove up after our guide had announced our passage on the CB radio. The logging trucks are on piece work and the roads are single track with passing places so it is a good idea to avoid someone trying to make the last load of the day with 20 tonnes of unsecured logs at 50 mph. They take no prisoners.

The sites where the loggers had “clear cut” the forest leaving only stumps were scenes of utter devastation. Our guide told us that they would be replanted and ready for harvesting in another 30 years or more. But only the faster growing trees like hemlocks were being planted here, The valuable and beautiful cedar was not as it takes too long to mature.

Back at the vistors centre I was looking around the discarded logging machinery and came across this old steam powered winch which would have been used to pull logs out of the forest. However the trees were getting there own back with some revovery to the land.


Our guide also mentioned the reduction in logging in this area caused by the spotted owl. Here is a quote from an official survey.

"In the heart of the Olympic Peninsula, the town of Forks, Wash., used to boast it was the logging capital of the world. Now, men who once made their living in the woods are prison guards, and the jagged edges of clear cuts once visible from the town have long since greened over. The listing of the spotted owl led to the eventual shutdown of 2.4 million acres of forest in Washington alone, and 30,000 forest jobs were lost.

The transition away from timber was hard in Forks, with many people losing their jobs, homes and timber-related businesses. But the townspeople say they've survived. And while they still resent the government for placing the needs of the owl over the needs of families, some say the community is stronger because it no longer relies on a single industry."

It was interesting to hear our guides take on the situation. There is still logging going on around Forks but only a tiny fraction of what is a renewable resource is being harvested. People who need top quality cedar for roof shingles are reduced to cutting sections out of stumps left from logging in previous years.

Hummers, Bandits and “rivet rivet rivet”.

We stayed a few nights a the Elwha Dam RV park where they have made a big effort to encourage wildlife into their park.








Allens and rufous hummingbirds
were regular visitors to the feeders and many finches including the very colourful goldfinch.








We also came across this fellow, working the shoreline, feeling under rocks with his fingers for crab. He did not seem much bothered by Carol and I but when Charro had a look he waddled back to some rocks for cover.








One unfortunate side effect of the parks green policy was their healthy and very very loud frog population. These guys could rivet for the USA and were proud to demonstrate this all night long.



We had forgotten about memorial day, a big US holiday and many of the campsites were booked out so we could not stay on. We moved on to Salt Water Creek where there are first come first served sites. The view over the Juan De Fuca sound was breathtaking and we saw someone who holidays with his cockatoo.














Charro had a couple of long trolley rides including one around a huge 19c gunnery bunker.

North West Washington

We are working our way along the North West coast of Washington after staying at the Escapees park at Chimacum.

Too many people too little land

It is rather sobering to keep coming across evidence of the damage that has been done to this area since the coming of the white man. The Olympic National Park shows up on a satellite image as an oasis of green surrounded by large brown patches left by clear cut logging. The rivers are empty of salmon and the elk are down to a few remnant herds. The shellfish in many areas are poisonous and finding ways to get shore access to dig them up on the seashore is getting harder as any patch of land with a view over the Puget sound is snapped up and built on. This allows the owner to control access to the shore.

These pics show the grave of Chief Seattle or Sealth.
He made such an impression on the settlers here that they named the major town after him.
Here is a version of his statement to those present when he signed the treaty passing the land in this area to the settlers but keeping hunting and fishing rights for his people.

"Every part of this land is sacred to my people. How can you buy and sell the sky, the warmth of the land? The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them? The perfumed flowers are our sisters, the deer, the horse, the great eagle, these are our brothers.

The rolling crests, the juice of the meadow, the body heat of the pony and man. All belongs to the same family.

What is man without the beasts? If all beasts were gone man would die from a great loneliness of spirit. For whatever happens to the beasts, soon happens to man. All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth, befalls the sons of the earth.

Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the earth he does to himself. Where is the thicket gone? Where is the eagle gone? And what is it to say goodbye to the swift pony and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival."

Still it is not all gloom and doom, the hydro electric dam next to our camp site at Port Angeles is to be removed. This should allow the return of salmon and seatrout to the river. There are fish hatcheries all around the coast and elk, although still hunted, are increasing. However the last wolf was shot in 1920 and there are no plans to reintroduce them.

Art Outside at Port Angeles

This is a walk in the woods with sculpture.
We had intended to push Charro round it but the paths were too narrow and too steep
for comfort. Still it was interesting with lots of challenging art but if I have nightmares tonight it will be because of one or two of the exhibits. The marching jackets
were particularly disturbing.

Puget Sound and the Kitsap Peninsula

The US Navy Undersea Museum

We were impressed by the professionalism of the presentation of all the exhibits here, from the bathyscaphes to the stories about the families of the sailors on the nuclear submarines that spent months at sea totally incommunicado. I loved the way they presented the development of the torpedo, from the first bomb on a long pole to today’s smart weapon. They poked fun at themselves over their early torpedoes which often scored own goals due to their preference for running round in circles. The “fruit machine” which set the firing of torpedoes on a WW2 worked.

The story of divers through history was really well explained and it is a sober reminder that people were working on the seabed to recover treasure in the 1700s using diving helmets and surface air pumps to supply them. They also showed the background of female divers in the US Navy and laid out the hurdles placed in front of those who tried to qualify.

Some of the exibts came from an early nuclear submarine and this included the "sail" as they call the conning tower and the control room for the periscopes which worked and we were to check on the Trek from inside the museum.





A mornings flying

The Tri Area Flyers flying site was within a couple of miles of our RV park and I got a few flights in while Carol and Charro were able to enjoy some record breaking temperatures on the grass. That evening the local news was full of the warm temperatures which had caused the rivers to run high with snow melt and a few misguided individuals who had gone swimming and been swept away, mostly to their deaths.

The Olympic Game Farm

We went rather reluctantly as our two previous visits to similar parks left us unhappy about the condition the animals were kept in. First the good news, we were able to drive the Trek through the park hand feeding sparrows
to peacocks and gophers to grizzlies. Many of the animals were able to run free in large enclosures and seemed happy and in some cases pretty fat. The exceptions were the bad news bit. There were several wolves kept individually in small pens with no enrichment in sight.
They were clearly bored and in some cases exhibited repetitive behaviour. These small cages also held a pair of tigers and a pair of lions who looked healthy enough but their cages were clearly unsuitable. This was bad enough for us to start looking for the contact details of Zoo Check and drafting a letter.

Puget Sound and the Kitsap Peninsula

We looked in on the Olympia wooden boat show for a morning but as it was limited to a few old wooden boats mostly power and the only old style tugboat had a diesel fitted rather than steam we were a little disappointed. Charro made it round the usual array of artisan stalls selling candles, scarves and bric a brac but his front shoulders are troubling him and he was glad to get back to the Trek and his soft bed.

We are moving up the Kitsap peninsula learning about the native Americans as we go.

Charro, Guns, The Attack Robin and Mount St. Helens

We decided that we needed to be close to a vet for a while as Charro was not doing so well. So we stayed for a week at a place called Kelso in Washington. The vet Charro saw in Portland had added another painkilling drug to be given in addition to the one he is already on. However he was off his food and looked as if he could only just stand up. After a couple of days he perked up and Carol found that a few crumbled crisps and some cheese in his dish encouraged him to eat. By the end of the week he was a lot brighter and while still wobbly, can manage to limp along with us for a few hundred yards. It looks like his right shoulder is giving him some problems, he is limping badly on this quarter now most of the time.

The attack robin.

Turdus migratorius as he is called is a widespread, territorial thrush. He is commonly called the American robin. When we arrived in Kelso we were assigned our camp site and the robin was not consulted. He was pissed, really really pissed. We woke up at dawn to this feathered homeland security defender making repeated assaults on our windows. He wanted us gone from his patch of land. Over the next seven days he never gave up, attacking first one window then the next. It seemed that he only rested from the attacks to crap. He crapped on our chairs, our table, Charro’s trolley, the motorbike but mostly on the Trek itself. This bird could crap for America.

The gun

We were some enquiries about getting access to a shooting range as I want to try my hand with a Colt 45 when we saw “the gun”. “The gun” that says quite a lot about American gun culture. At least I think it does. What was special about this gun. It was a bolt action, 22 calibre rifle. Nothing unusual so far. What made it special was it’s size. It was made for a child, it was half size, a 10 year old was a perfect fit for this gun. It was not a toy, it fired 22 long rifle cartridges and it could kill at a quarter of a mile. Oh, I forgot the gob smack, it was pink.

Yup, a little 10 old girls first killing weapon, a Bolt Action Barbie 22.








Mount St Helens

We visited the slopes of Mount St Helens, It is 28 years since it blew it’s top 10 miles in the air, and ash all round the world. The topography was so changed in 24 hours that rangers who had worked the slopes of St Helens for twenty years could not work out where they were from the air. Today they are still containing debris from the eruption behind a man made dam and tunnelling through natures dam to release water in a controlled way. Watching the short but terrifying film of the eruption reminded me that nature has the last say in matters. In seconds 100,000 + trees were levelled. In minutes giant superheated pyroclastic flows were incinerating surface life miles away. In hours sufficient sediment had flowed into local rivers to reduce their depth by 30 feet, stranding ocean going cargo vessels. In days ash from the eruption fell in China.


We are sticking quite closely to our planned itinerary at the moment. After exploring the North West corner of Washington we should be crossing into British Columbia at then end of May or the first days of June.


Carol’s bit.

I was enticed out here under false pretences. “you will only need shorts and
T- shirts “ anyone reading this blog must think I only have one coat. I do, and have worn it constantly since I got here. I left all of my winter clothes back home. I’m now told that the temperatures this weekend are supposed to be up in the 70’s at home, while we have cold and rain. Even my dog is wearing a rain coat.
I left my winter coat behind. ( you can probably see why )

The advantage of this weather is the plant life, the grass is thick and healthy and some of the plants are breathtaking. Oregon and Washington are known for their horticulture. A lot of the plants are Japanese, Azaleas, Rhododendrons, Acers. The soil here is good and people have taken pride in their gardens I’ve got my own little garden in the RV but I’m not sure what the Canadian customs are going to do with it, some things, especially certain plants are not allowed across the boarder. We’re not even sure about Charro’s dog food.

NET 10 CELL PHONE RANT

Apologies to anyone not in the USA waiting for a phone call from us. We have spent a month trying to get NET 10, our phone service provider, to fix our internatonal calling. On 6 occasions we were told the problem was fixed and to wait for 24.48.72 hours and it would work. In other words we got the run around.

After we registered an official complaint with the Better Business Bureau they turned international back on, but it took some determination and patience to fight our way through their always polite but pretty ineffective "Customer Service Dept."

The next few days were spent listening to " We are sorry all international lines are busy". We had never heard this message in the previous 6 months. Oh yes we were able to make the odd call.