August 2007

Greetings to all,

In our travels we have seen what hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and fire can do to a forest. After a hurricane, the woods looks like huge hands have swept trees of all sizes flat to the ground. Floods carve land into new profiles and carries everything from trees, boulders, and roads away. We have seen where tornadoes have pulled up young trees out of the ground and break ancient ones in half, tossing them around like toothpicks. And to see the aftermath of a fire is heartbreaking, all the green turned black and charred. But none of what we have seen compares to the destruction still visible at Mt. Saint Helen even now twenty-seven years after its eruption. It is as if all these forces left the landscape destroyed and it is only just now starting to be reborn. It is awesome and beautiful and wonderful – like seeing what the world might have been like in the beginning.

We have finished our research in Washington except for Gifford Pinchot and Columbia Gorge Scenic Area. When they are completed, in mid-September, we will have visited all the National Forests in the lower 48 States and have only the two national forests in Alaska to do next year, the 14th year of our project. (Not sure what we'll do about the national forest in Puerto Rico.) It doesn't seem so long ago when this idea was born on the way back from our long weekend of camping in Jefferson National Forest's Bear Tree campground. What an adventure! And August added a lot to the story.

August saw us rediscovering the Olympic National Forest (NF) and finishing up the Wenatchee NF. The contrast between these two forests is noteworthy. The Olympic NF surrounds the Olympic National Park and is almost tropical in vegetation. The Olympic's eastern side is along Hood Canal, which is actually a fjord, relatively dry, fairly built up, and an easy drive from the Seattle-Tacoma area. On the west side is the Pacific Ocean, which provides a lot more moisture to the forest, is an hour farther from the big urban populations. Green is the dominate color in the Olympic NF campgrounds. Hemlock, Western cedar, Douglas fir, and majestic Sitka spruce provide dense green canopies overhead. Big leaf and Vine maple, berry bushes, and shrubs fill the eye-level space. There are maybe 200 different types of moss and lichen species wrapped all around, draped from, and hugging the trees, rocks, and even street signs. Wood sorrel, ferns, and other shade-loving ground covers give you a green carpet to walk on. No doubt in our minds, the Olympic National Forest is a beautiful place. Now, if the weather would just warm up a little, say to mid-70s, we might never want to leave.

Frankly, we haven't had any really HOT weather during our travels in Washington. What we did experience was in the Wenatchee NF and there we had only a couple of 90ish days - lucky timing on our part. We have been told the area east of the Cascade Mountains (the Wenatchee stretches through this area) is in its 12th year of drought but that relates to a lack of moisture, not high temperatures. Earlier this summer the Wenatchee NF did have a couple of major fires (cause was in part attributed to the drought) but they had little impact on our work. However, the smoke from them and the fires in Idaho did cause us some frustrations in our picture taking.

Where the dominate color in the Olympic NF is green, for the Wenatchee NF, it is shades of blue. The Wenatchee stretches along the east side of the Cascade Mountains from the south end of the North Cascade National Park (NP) down to Mt Rainier NP. It seemed every campground we surveyed was on a lake, river, or creek (most reported to be full of trout or salmon although we never saw any) of some shade of blue. The road to every campground either wound its way beside, around, or along some flowing water in the shadow of a mountain dotted with blue ice glaciers or huge patches of bright white snow usually under a sapphire blue sky.

There is no two ways about it, Wenatchee NF is a huge forest. We heard it has over 700 recreation areas (campgrounds, trailheads, picnic areas, etc) and over 500 vault toilets in the dispersed camping areas! It may be the largest NF we have worked on. Although we might not think it is the most beautiful forest we have been in, the Wenatchee NF was a super place to explore. However, after almost a month in this forest we are ready to explore the next forest.

As most of you must realize by now, one thing we delight in is discovering good places to eat and we found a few this summer. There is Whistlin' Jack Lodge in Cliffdell, WA. Established in 1931, like most businesses deep in a national forest, Whistlin' Jack is a lodge, restaurant, café, gas station, general store, and just about everything else. It is a beautiful location with a lovely log lodge and some outstanding food (including super yummy homemade donuts.) At the other end of the spectrum is Quinault Lake Lodge. Very posh and elegant, it was built in 1909 on a site long used as a campsite by Native people. It has developed several dishes unique to its dining room but it is the atmosphere rather than the food we enjoyed. There have been several small small "ma ‘n pa" size restaurants that give us some great meals (Tall Timbers in Randle, WA and The Place in Forks, WA to name two). And we have had some pretty lousy experiences. One outstanding example was Buddy's Burgers near Sequim, WA which served us really lousy burgers.

As we said, September will see us complete the Pacific Northwest Region and then we'll head east for our annual visit with our grandson and his parents. On the way, we hope to revisit the St. Joe and Lolo NFs to see what has changed and to get some more photographs. After we have sufficiently spoiled Tyler , we'll head for Bisbee. It is amazing to realize our season of researching is almost over.

Our contact with the outside world this summer has been limited to local radio and occasionally NPR and CNN on our Direct-TV. We have heard of floods devastating portions of the country, outrageous temperatures baking other areas, and fires raging here and there. (Sounds like Mt. Saint Helen.) We hope you have not had to deal with any of these problems and the upcoming fall season will be good for you and yours.

Suzi and Fred