Washington Tidal Pool

Anemone in Washington State Tidal Pool

Green Sea Anemone © 2010 Bo Mackison

Tidal pool discoveries from our visit to Tongue Point on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington.

While we were climbing on the slippery, blue-mussel and seaweed mixture that is exposed on the shoreline rocks at low tide, we did see quite a few tidal pools. No star fish or hermit crabs or sand dollars, but there was quite a lot of floating yellow rockweed in the pools of water.

We also saw three pools that had green sea anemones. Even though they look like underwater flowers, they are animals. As prey moves past the anemone, it shoots a tentacle or two out from it’s hidden place and paralyzes its prey, typically a small fish or crustacean, with a deadly sting. Pretty, but not such pretty manners — if you’re a sculpin swimming by.

Tongue Point Splash

Tongue Point on Olympic Peninsula

Tongue Point Splash © 2010 Bo Mackison

When we were traveling the Pacific Northwest, we walked out on Tongue Point just south of Point Crescent, Washington during low tide and checked out the tidal pools. We saw a bit of activity – a few purple and green anemones, some sea urchins. I was hoping to see a star fish or two, but that didn’t happen.

The shore at low tide was covered with mussels, sea kelp and seaweed, all slippery stuff. I wielded a hiking stick in one hand and my camera attached to a monopod in the other, and just barely managed to stay afoot. A few times we were splashed by incoming waves as the tide started rising — just added to the sense of adventure! At one point we were laughing so hard, I wondered if we’d get back up the cliff at the appointed time. Yep, we did.

I took only one lens, so my photographs of the tidal pools themselves are seriously lacking, but the scenery was still spectacular.

And it really was great fun. I’d go exploring at low tide if ever given the chance again. What amazing life barely under the sea!

Two Roses and the Tale of a Trip

Pink Roses at University of British Columbia Botanical Gardens in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Two Roses © 2010 Bo Mackison

Still wading through many photograph files, pulling out special ones from my recent trip to Seattle, Vancouver and the Olympic Peninsula. There are so many photographs that I would love to share — why take photographs if you don’t share, right?

While we were on the Pacific coast, my younger daughter and I visited our 47th (Washington) and 48th (Oregon) states. Sherpa and I always believed that we should introduce our three children to the wonders of their own country first. Then they could take on the world when they were ready to explore further. When our youngest child turned 5, we started going on three week summer vacations, pulling a pop up tent everywhere we traveled.

We concentrated on the sites in the National Park System, but we balanced our trips with visits to some of the major US cities, too. (A few of our favorite National Parks — Yellowstone, Craters of the Moon, Acadia, Padre Islands, Glacier. A few of our favorite cities — New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, San Francisco, Santa Fe, Chicago.)

When we stopped our travels – yep, the kids grew up and moved away and got jobs and took on other commitments — we had all visited (not just flown over, but visited) 46 of the 50 United States. Well, for the sake of full disclosure, Sherpa was at 47 because of a quick business trip to Seattle, but the rest of us had yet to see Washington, Oregon, Alaska or Hawaii.

When I offered my daughter an after-graduation-before-starting-big-job trip, she immediately proposed a vacation to the Pacific Northwest to capture States #47 and 48. And so the trip we just completed was planned.

I’ve posted photographs from Washington state – we traveled over 1,000 miles in Washington — but nothing from Oregon.

Nothing against Oregon, really! But we only had 10 days and we couldn’t see everything. Especially after we added a few spontaneous stops to our original itinerary. In order to visit our 48th state, we crossed the bridge from Longview, Washington to Rainier, Oregon on the last day we were there. (We had intended to go to Portland, but that was still miles away and we had a plane to catch in Seattle later that night.)

To make the state “count” according to family rules, we had to eat something while there and we had to do an activity, preferably something unusual.

We stopped at a little place not far from the bridge and ordered ice cream cones. I had blueberry cheesecake ice cream, delicious, one of the biggest single dip cones I’ve ever had, real blueberries, of course. We were in Oregon, right? Manda had pumpkin, a solid choice, too. Then we bought a lottery ticket and played lotto. (It was only the second lottery ticket I’ve ever purchased, and Manda’s first, so it counted as something unusual.)

Then we checked off #48, turned around and headed for Sea-Tac.

Blue Lupine in the Cascades

Blue Lupine, Washington State Wildflower

Blue Lupine in the Cascades © 2010 Bo Mackison

Mother Nature makes it really hard to drive on the back roads of Washington state. Every few yards along the sides of the roads are massive spreads of blue and purple lupine. When she wants to make it especially difficult to concentrate, she adds a few white or pink lupine into the mix. Occasionally there are yellow ones, too.

I finally pulled off the road to get my photography fix for the morning. We were driving from Seattle to Vancouver — shouldn’t have been all that difficult, seeing as it is only a two hour drive. But we were already a day behind our plans, since we had taken the turn off I-5 the morning before for a spontaneous detour through the North Cascades. But even being off schedule wasn’t a good enough reason to not stop. So stop we did.

The lupine were definitely worth the delay.

Golden Rock

Rocks and Driftwood on Ruby Beach

Golden Rock @ 2010 Bo Mackison

Close up view of Ruby Beach as high tide is approaching. I had to hurry to capture this little golden rock on the weathered log, reminded me of a little golden egg resting in a nest,  before the waves started to pool around my ankles.

Even so, by the time we had walked north along the beach a hundred yards and back, we were cut off from the path to the car. Nothing dangerous, and there were lots of people still walking the area, but we all had to either walk across a fallen tree that functioned as a (very narrow, slippery) foot bridge or wade through the Hoh River  at the spot where it enters the Pacific. We chose the route of wet socks, wet hiking boots, and a story to add to our ever increasing pile of memories.

Ruby Beach is on the Pacific Coast in Olympic National Park.