October, 2018
At the end of my last blog post, my friends had just dropped me off at my trailer in the campground and then they drove back to their home in the town of Sequim. On my own now, after another great day with friends, I climbed up into my trailer, happy as could be. About 5 minutes later the skies opened up and the rain poured down! Well, ok, I guess I won’t be hitching up the trailer to the truck right now. So much for my plan to do that today, before the rain!
It rained hard the rest of that late afternoon and all evening. So I just snuggled inside my little trailer where I was warm and dry.
By morning, wonder of wonders, the rain had stopped. The trees and bushes were still sopping wet and noisy with all of that rich, dripping water. But the skies were dry and clear.
I had intended to head home this morning, but I just couldn’t resist … I took off in the truck for a little morning exploration figuring I’d hitch up the trailer after lunch and then I would head home.
So this last morning here, it was just me and my big white truck. I drove along back roads as close to the saltwater of the Strait of Juan de Fuca as I could. This late in the year, not many people were out and about so I had the roads pretty much to myself.
I drove past the John Wayne Marina and Resort and the RV campground there.
In the photo above, you can see the marina. The campground is in the lower left corner of the photo. Most of the water in the photo above is Sequim Bay, but you can see a narrow spit of land in the upper left corner. Beyond that spit of land is the big Strait of Juan de Fuca that all of the big commercial ocean-going ships use to transit to get to Seattle or Tacoma in the USA or to Vancouver or Victoria in Canada on their way here from all over the world. That spit of land is almost a mile long, but even at that it doesn’t completely protect or enclose Sequim Bay. The circular breakwater rip-rap that surrounds the John Wayne Marina is needed to protect small private boats from all of the huge wakes from the ocean-going ships.
My next interesting stop was at the “foot” of Dungeness Spit. Because I needed to head home today, I didn’t take the time to park and then hike out along Dungeness Spit. That will have to wait for another day. But I did drive through the campground there and note my two favorite campsites for future use.
Both of the campsites above had excellent views of the Strait, with Canada’s Vancouver Island off in the distance to the north. Neither campsite has electrical hookups, but both have decent solar potential for most of the day. Unfortunately, most of the campsites at this exceptional campground (the Dungeness Recreation Area) can’t be reserved, they are almost all first-come first served.
That was about all the time I had this morning for exploring and puttering about. I needed to get back to camp and get hitched up in order to head home. But on my drive back to the Sequim Bay State Park campground, I drove past one bay with this lovely wooden boat at anchor.
How peaceful.
I managed to get back to my campsite, have lunch, and then get the trailer and truck hitched up before the rain hit again in the afternoon. Shortly after I drove out of the campground with trailer in tow, it poured! But I was blessed, wasn’t I? Not one drop of rain during my morning drive, and not one drop of rain while I was hitching up. What a super three days I had on the north end of the Olympic Peninsula at Sequim Bay. There sure are lots more things to see on my next trip here. I’m looking forward to it and will keep you posted. 🙂