Day 92 - Friday, October 17, 1997Elma RV Park, Elma, Washington - We drove east, then north up the peninsula to Olympic National Park. Our first stop was at Lake Quinnault, where we saw what is reportedly the world's largest sitka spruce tree, which is 191 feet tall. This sucker was also about 58 feet around. Buck didn't like this tree because he didn't have enough pee to properly mark it.Next we drove up to the Hoh Rain Forest. Did you know that there was a temperate rain forest in Washington? We did!! This place was gorgeous. The trees were huge and many were covered with various mosses, lichen, and fungi. The rain forest is big into recycling. The big spruce trees will eventually fall. When they do, lichens and fungi start eating the tree, the byproduct being a great place for other spruce to germinate. As the tree rots, the baby spruce continue to grow. Eventually the roots of the new spruce reach the ground and the old spruce completely rots away. The result is a straight line of trees with holes in the base where the dead tree once was. Amazing! The Hoh Rain Forest is along the Hoh River near the Hoh Indian Reservation. The Hoh Indians were known as being the only palindrome tribe in the world. Chief Feich was their leader and Tang Gnat was their most famous warrior. After hiking around the rain forest for a while, we headed to Ruby Beach, where we once again saw the ocean. Unfortunately we didn't hit the beach until a few minutes after sunset. Judging by the orange sky we had seen earlier, we missed a good one. That's okay. As the song goes, "The sun will go down, tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow..."
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