The Kestner Homestead is near the Quinault National Park Ranger Station. Depending on your choice of route (there are several loops), the distance is a couple miles. It is a beautiful spot to appreciate the lush growth of this temperate rainforest.
I have published shots from this spot before, but I was there last week again and took these from the middle of the bridge that connects the North Shore Road and the South Shore Road. While the river looks well behaved here, it recently washed out the South Shore Rd. That means a longer drive on a road that has foot deep potholes in places to get to the East Fork Quinault Trail. It is also a special treat to visit one of the major temperate rain forest valleys with such wonderful sunny weather.
Wolf Bar Camp is on the North Fork Quinault River in the Olympic National Park. This camp that is often used as the first night’s destination while hiking up the river, especially if you have had a long drive over to the Olympic Peninsula, so haven’t had an early start to the day. This is looking west and up into the Colonel Bob Wilderness Area.
Lake Chelan is fjord-like. It is about 50 miles long (over 81 km) and averages 1.3 miles (2 km) wide. At the upper (north) end the lake lies between mountain ridges that soar up 6600 feet (2000 m). There is a boat that runs from the town of Chelan at the southern end to Stehekin at the north end. It makes a lovely day trip with stops at 25 Mile and Lucerne on the way.
These two images are taken from the same location as my last post … different days, different years, different cameras. These are taken with my first digital camera (an Olympus E10). The images are much softer … a lot less detail. I like the softness that gives the images, even though it does create limits to your editing (such as the strange edges on the clouds on the image above).
Again, these are taken from the bridge over the Quinault River just outside the Olympic National Park boundary.
