Tuesday 9/19/23 Hiking Heart O' the Hills Trail

 

Camping in Olympic National Park

It was a little cooler today, it was overcast and didn't get out of the 60s. The rain came in around 4:00 with sprinkles. It's suppose to stay around through out the night and be gone by morning. 

I got up at 7:00 and lit the oven so I could make cinnamon french toast sticks for breakfast. Larry already had turned on the heater to get the chill out of the air. After breakfast we got ready to go for a hike. There is a hiking trail that starts in E loop, not far away. The trail was Heart of the Hills Trail, it goes for 2.1 miles one way to the park boundary, then you hike it back. We ended up hiking 2 miles of it. By the end of the hike we had hiked 4.5 miles. The trail goes through a gorgeous old growth forest with giant trees. We hiked up and down the mountain. We didn't see the creek but we heard it flowing by the trail. We had to be careful because there was a lot of roots from the trees growing through the trail. As we hiked we stopped now and then just to admire the giant trees. There were some downed trees and the roots system was huge over 6 feet. Larry took a picture of me standing by one of the trees Pictures can't show you how tall the trees are but they can show you how wide the trunk is. I felt the bark of the tree and told Larry it was very smooth and soft. We took bridges and boardwalks over where the creeks were flowing. The forest was amazing. We had hiked about 2 miles and Larry checked his GPS and we were .33 of a mile left to do. We decided we had hiked enough so we turned around and headed back. We rested on a downed tree and had a granola bar. On the hike back we didn't stop as much and it looked different because we were walking the opposite direction. We got off the trail a few times to let other hikers pass. We didn't see anyone until we were hiking back (two couples and a couple of single ladies). We said our hellos and continued on our way. We had a super hike.

Giant pine tree

 

A perfect circle of a tree

 

Trail through the growth

 

Boardwalk/bridge

We spent the rest of the day relaxing in the Minnie. I thought it was cold so Larry turned the Wave3 back on. Then I took an hour and a half nap. When I woke up Larry had turned off the heater because it was getting too hot in the Minnie. Larry relaxed with a book. When I work up I worked on the Super Sudoku once again and finally finished it. Afterwards I started reading What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty.  

Before the rain I walked around the campground. While walking I talked to a ranger who was walking a beautiful Weimaraner. He was trained to track cougars. I talked to a couple out of Canada for about 45 minutes. I had a great walk. I ended up doing 16,500 steps which put me in 1st place in my group.