We looked through our hiking guide and decided that our first official trip would be down in the southwest corner of Washington, to Cape Disappointment. There were several reasons I was drawn to this destination, so after a discussion of the merits we booked our campsite reservation and made our plans. One of the reasons we chose this for our first trip was that the trails were rated as easy for beginners - a group for which I definitely qualify for membership. Since I have always adored the ocean, that was an obvious attraction. My son lives a little over an hour away from the campground, and I knew that we'd be able to see him either on our way down, or on our way back. And, finally, on the Long Beach Peninsula sits one of the most amazing stores I have ever been to - Jack's Country Store. If you have a couple spare hours to browse, I highly recommend a trip to Jack's. It's like stepping back in time to the General Store of yesteryear. They have a little bit of everything, and it's shoved into every nook and cranny available. Their online store is pretty great too, so take a look! www.jackscountrystore.com
On the day of our trip we decided to make a stop at Cabela's on our way to look at a few things . . . which turned into over 3 hours of spending way too much money. Usually at Cabela's I'd think R would spend the most money, but I was the one who walked away with a lighter bank account that day. Too many things that I wanted! I looked like a walking advertisement for Cabela's with my new camoflage sweatshirt with the bright plum CABELA'S across the front, and my 2 different baseball caps with CABELA'S on them! I got a rain hat too - we WERE heading for the coast afterall.
By the time we finally got to the campground it was dark, it was raining and the mosquitoes were out in droves. If you've never set up a tent in the dark, in the rain, while being eaten alive by blood sucking insects, well, you've never lived!
I put on the headlamp R got for me, and together we set up the tent. Poor R. Every single time I looked up at him, or just looked forward at all, I blinded him with my lamp. I'm pretty sure he was seeing stars the entire time. In the midst of the setting up process, wet, chilly, itchy and getting grumpy, my son decides to join us for a couple of hours. We hadn't loaded up any firewood for the trip, since we figured we would go into town to get some the next day so there we sat, with a small lantern for light, my headlamp blinding both my son and R, and sat at our picnic table, eating rehydrated hiking food while visiting in the rain. Together the three of us walked down to the beach to watch the waves crashing to shore, and making a memory that I'll cherish forever. Moments like that you take with you in your heart, to think about and remember later on, enjoying them all over again.
Once G finally left to go back home, R and I crawled into our tent, snuggled down into our sleeping bags, and with the song of the waves crashing onto the shore as our lullaby, went to sleep. We hoped to wake up to sun . . . but as it is likely to do at the coast, it was still misting in the morning, so we hurried through getting ourselves together for the day, boiled water for our coffee and instant oatmeal, and though we left our tent set up, we packed up our gear to put into the car - never can be too careful with the security of your gear.
Time to find some trails! We packed our small 7L packs with water, energy bars, some gorp (mixture of nuts, candies and Chex), bug spray, and bandaids (just in case), and headed out to the main gate at the park to get a map and some guidance from the ranger. After looking at the map for a bit, we chose the 1st path to take, and with a light mist falling on us, the crash of the waves on the rocks, and kamakaze mosquitoes doing their best to drain us of our blood, set out.
The trail we took that morning wound up around to the top of an overlook, giving us the most amazing view of the coastline and the lighthouse to the south of us. The trekking poles came in handy for stabilization, and R walked ahead of me with his cigar, which helped considerably with the mosquitoes.
All total I think we walked around 5 miles that day, and would have done more, but we were distracted by one of those "finds" you happen across in unexpected places . . . gourmet lunch right there in the park. Read on to find out where you can find the most amazing woodfire pizza we'd ever had!
No comments:
Post a Comment