September, 2024
Let me admit that I have my blog posts a little bit out of order here. I was so happy to have had those elk come right through the campground, so close to me, that I posted that blog post from today’s afternoon elk invasion before I posted this morning’s blog post. I just couldn’t wait to share the elk with you folks. 🙂
So now let me go back to this morning. Rain! Many of you will know that you can’t or shouldn’t live in western Washington or western British Columbia if you can’t stand much rain. It rains here! This morning at Dosewallips State Park, I woke to the lovely (but loud) sound of rain on the roof of Towhee the Trailer. Here’s a video from inside my trailer that morning … listen to the rain!
I love my trailer. I was perfectly safe and warm and dry inside, but I didn’t want to sit inside, waiting, maybe for hours and hours, until the rain quit … how long would that take? So I opted to head out and go for a drive in the big white truck, and join the rain out in the world. 🙂
I found some nice back roads in the woods, so pretty. But the most interesting back road I found was right along the waters of Hood Canal. And I do mean right along the water! If you want to drive along this road, it’s Seal Rock Road, north of the Dosewallips campground. It might have been part of the original “highway” here many years ago, but now the main highway bypasses Seal Rock Road and I bet the people that live on this road are very happy about that. Ok, let’s go take a drive on Seal Rock Road. (You can always click on the photos to enlarge them.)
Seal Rock Road truly does run right along the edge of Hood Canal. You can see that it’s a grey wet day, although the rain clouds were already beginning to dissipate by the time I found this road.
I love Madrona trees. They are so beautiful.
I was driving south on Seal Rock Road, with Hood Canal on my left … so I drove with my window open and simply paused here and there to take photos.
Just a little way down the road were these large homes on the right side of the road. There wasn’t room for homes on the left side of the road!
On the left side of the road was this structure below. It would be a lovely place for the folks who live across the road to walk over and sit on that deck and enjoy the view on a nice warm, sunny day … or walk down the stairs to the beach and explore.
No sandy beaches here! But still, if you wear good shoes, and in good weather, and especially at low tide (the tide was high when I was here), I bet there’s lots to see and explore here.
Further on down the road, I spotted this upturned dinghy just off to the side of the road. It appears to be a Livingston dinghy. I used to own one. They are probably the best dinghies on the planet … they are so stable in the water because they have two hulls and don’t tip sideways very much. I hope someone put this dinghy here purposefully and is taking care of it, tho it looked a bit worn.
Then further down the road a bit more, the road moved over a little and allowed space enough for homes to be built right on the edge of the beach, right next to Hood Canal. I would be happy to live in the house below! The house faces east over Hood Canal. What stupendous sunrises you’d see from that deck.
Ah, and I think I shared the photo below with you in a blog post at the beginning of this camping trip. It was a gorgeous, peaceful spot in the woods (on the right hand side of the road), but obviously the home had seen better days, and oh my word my heart hurt for that boat.
And yet just a bit further was this house (below). The front door and the garage door faced Hood Canal. I was surprised the windows weren’t HUGE so they too could have a beautiful view of the water. But it was a nice home and was very well cared for.
At the south end of Seal Rock Road, it rejoined highway 101. The rain had stopped by then, so I headed back towards my campsite at Dosewallips State Park.
The two photos below show how beautiful this stretch of highway 101 is. It definitely was autumn when I was here.
I arrived back at my campsite late that morning after that great back road country drive. I parked the truck and was about to climb back up into my trailer when these folks (below) arrived in the campsite right next to me, my new neighbor. Another Escape trailer! And another big white pickup truck. 🙂 They waved, I waved. I took the video below being careful not to get their license plate number in the video. Then we chatted and chatted (and chatted more that evening). I posted the video online and emailed them a link to it. They loved it. It’s just a short little video, but it meant a lot to them since no one had ever done that for them. Oh, and he apologized to me for the dent in the door of their truck, it had just happened a few days prior to this and he swore it would be fixed as soon as they got home! Hey, no apology needed! 🙂
I love back roads, any time, but maybe even more when it’s raining just a bit. Let’s keep finding each other, finding the back roads (or the main roads), and keep on doing what we love, finding things that bring us joy and peace. Even in the rain. 🙂