Hurricane Ridge, Olympic National Park

August 21st,2022

Port Angeles and Sequim (pronounced Squim) are cute neighboring port towns along the southern shores of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. To their south lies the Olympic Mountains range. Ferries take passengers and cars across the strait to Vancouver island and British Columbia. US Highway 101 passes in East West direction through these towns. 

After dinner in Port Angeles on Saturday we stayed in Sequim . The highlight of the stay was the discovery of an ironing board and iron in the room! Last entire week none of the places carried these, much to my disappointment. I don’t know if any of you would notice my sarees were crumpled in earlier pictures of this travel. This is unlike me. Can you imagine my joy at finding the iron late at night on the last leg of the trip? 😃

After checking out early morning on Sunday we filled up gas at Costco and picked up coffee, tea and some pastries from a small bake shop. Then headed out to the Summit Ridge,which is part of the Olympic National Park. It was foggy at the foothills but as we drove to higher elevations the skies got clearer and the glaciers appeared in their full glory. 

We stopped by the visitor center to get some tips from the Ranger. Met a couple from Austria who offered to take our pictures. Seeing me in a sare the lady asked what part of India we are from. They had lived in New Delhi for 3 years for her husband’s job. She had very good things to say about people in India. Later we met them at several places during our hikes. 

We took the hike up to sunrise point. It was a steep trail of over a mile one way. On this trail was a stretch that had trees on both sides. Somehow we ( Amita and me)were walking by ourselves in that section when we heard a rustle on our left side. We stopped to see if someone was in the woods. It wasn’t a fellow hiker. It was a black bear 😳! That too within 6 feet from us! And before we could figure out which way to run it came out of the bushes on to the trail. Luckily it was not fascinated by my saree or we would be in deep trouble. It had its own plans for lunch, it seemed, because it crossed the trail and wandered away onto the other side of the forest without glancing at us. Panic and joy alternating within seconds ! How many of you have experienced such moments ? 

We carried on to climb up to sunrise point. The view from the top was beyond gorgeous. The Olympic mountain peaks, some covered with glaciers, others flirting with clouds, the winding road seen below and the sprawling forests and meadows occasionally highlighted by vivid wildflowers. They made us forget about the encounter with the bear we had just minutes earlier. 

As we were hiking down from the summit of the trail we stopped by a curve on the path to take pictures. Two Indian origin ladies walking past us stopped to say “ that’s a beautiful saree you are wearing. Where is it from?”. I told them it is from Odisha. They asked if it needs starch? Is it difficult to maintain? Having answered all their queries the conversation shifted to introducing ourselves. I noticed that both of them looked nearly identical. They confirmed they were identical twins. Both speech therapists, trained at Nair Hospital in Mumbai in the 70s. We took pictures together and shared our numbers. Imagine how a saree starts conversation between strangers and makes new friends ! 

Leaving the National Park we headed to Port Angeles for lunch. Our nephew recommended a restaurant on the waterfront. Got a table with a window view of the strait. Food was yummy. Even better was the huckleberry cider. 

From there we headed to Sequim. This region is known for its lavender farms. Earlier in the morning we had stopped by one but it was closed. So this time we swung by again to pick some lavender to carry home. The lavender plants extended over several acres of this family owned property. Thousands of bees were hovering over the blossoms. We tried to evade them as we cut some flowers to take home. Unfortunately not without sustaining one really painful sting on my left thumb that remained worrisome several days later.

Moving on from the farm we took a detour towards Poulsbo. This is a port town of settlers from Nordic countries. There are cute shops on the Main Street and the typical Scandinavian design homes on the back streets, Nordic national flags at every corner brought back memories of our trip to those countries a few years back. We indulged in some really special blackberry ice cream and then took a walk at the waterfront before getting back on the road.

 The drive back to Issaquah was accompanied by some really lovely post-sunset colors in the sky and occasional glimpses of Mt Rainier in the distance. More importantly it gave us time for a heart to heart talk without the distraction of sightseeing in this stretch.

Now back home in the company of family in Issaquah, having enjoyed home food, ready to go to sleep. One more day in Washington before we would fly back to California. Hoped to make the most out of it.

Saree for the day was a lavender colored hazarbutti weave in cotton from Odisha. The borders and pallu are in black. Ikat work depicting multiple motifs such as fish, elephants,peacocks, lotus, flowers, conch etc adorn the pallu, hence it is called sarabandha . Fish, tortoise and floral motifs are placed in the midst of linear thread work on the body to form the classic hazaar( thousand) butti pattern.