We drove the S2000 out to Lake Ozette a few years ago to scope out what’s there, and have always wanted to go back and make the walk out to the beach. The campsite is very small, though, and doesn’t take reservations, so we were taking a chance that we would have a spot.
It’s at the end of a very long and windy road, and it would be a bummer to drive all the way out and not have anywhere to park. There is a private campground across the road, but when we went over there and checked, I’m not sure he really has places for anything bigger than a tent.
I decided we might have a good chance at a spot on a Tuesday morning, so we timed our drive out to get there just a bit before checkout time. And lo and behold there were three kayakers packing up their cars and leaving a spot open right near the lakeshore.
There are two three mile trails from the lake to the coast, connected by a 3 mile beach walk between them, making a nice 9 mile loop. My “plan” was to hike the northerly trail on Wednesday, rest up on Thursday, then hike the southerly trail on Friday before Britt & Buddy and the grandnephews arrived for the weekend.
The trails were typical Pacific NW rain forest, through the woods, although this northerly trail had a LOT of boardwalk. We presume that had to do with how wet the path had been and the only way to make it viable year round for all the traffic it gets. We started out strong, and at about mile 1 Rob asks “are you really sure you’re up for 6 miles?”. I responded with a resounding “Hell yes” because it was so beautiful and so nice to get out and exercise. What I wasn’t taking into account was the reason I hadn’t exercised most of the summer was because I had fallen on my left knee Memorial Day weekend and it had never recovered. It was actually in pretty bad shape still, and the week before on a girl’s sailing trip it totally gave out on me for 24 hours.
The path was beautiful with some open meadows (where I clearly had my outside voice calling “HEY BEAR”) and lots of gentle up and down slopes. Somewhere around mile two I was starting to question the wisdom of this hike, but was too stubborn to turn around before we got to the beach. At mile 3 when we arrived at the beach I was exhausted.
We had our lunches and decided to head back. I was quietly doing some calculations in my head. First, how much time left before dark. And second, if there was cell service (which there was not), could I call a boat in Port Angeles to come all the way out the Strait, around Cape Flattery, pick me up on the beach, take me back to PA, then hire a taxi back out to Ozette (170 miles r/t by boat and another 75 miles by car – versus a 3 mile walk). So we walked. And I knew there was no other option but to keep putting one foot in front of the other and hope my knee held up all the way back.
Did we take that second walk on Friday? Hell no! Did the grandnephews come for a visit? Sadly also no. Rob & I realized besides the 3 miles walks, there really weren’t kid things to do except to swim in the lake. So we spared them a 3 hour drive and will plan another trip. The good news is we took the kitties and they did great! There was hardly a tiny meow or any whining in the car on the way out, and they were fine in the trailer.
