Written by: Megan Madill (human).
A warm, full-circle sentiment settled around my shoulders as I crossed the border into Oregon to begin the second leg of my Great American Road Trip. After all, this whole adventure can be traced back to my first solo camping trip to Oregon back in September 2022. I’ve made a habit of visiting every year since: Mount Hood, Rogue River/Crater Lake, Bend, and now Yachats, a little town on the windy coast. I stayed at The Drift Inn, a charming and quirky little place, in one of their hostel-esque “pedal out” rooms.
The constant photo stops prolonged what should have been an 8-hour drive.
I checked in just as the sun was setting, showered and prepared for an early night. Based on an alert from my Aurora app, I then hopped back in the car for some northern lights chasing, but was unsuccessful :(
This visit was just a quick stopover on my way to Washington, so most of my waking hours were spent driving (which, lucky for me, is my favorite thing to do in Oregon). The next morning I was up and on my way north again, heading for Olympic National Park.
In the first draft of my road trip itinerary, I had penciled in two nights at each of Washington’s three national parks, but it quickly became clear that I’d need to be more selective, and I unceremoniously booted both Rainier and North Cascades off the list so I could keep Olympic. I could not be more pleased with my decision! Olympic is truly unique: the variety in what you can see in one day is unlike any other park I’ve been to, and by the time I left, I was ready to declare a new favorite park.
Sol Duc Falls in Olympic National Park
My first hike was to Sol Duc Falls, and it immediately established a stark contrast against the arid red deserts that had defined the last leg of the trip. Indeed, my choice of audiobook (Dune by Frank Herbert) would have suited that leg much better, though it did serve to underscore the beauty of Olympic National Park in a new dimension. In the car, I was immersed in a tale of constant preoccupation with finding water on a desert planet, and in the natives’ incredulity at the idea of a world where water falls from the sky and pools in great lakes and oceans, rather than having to be plucked from the air by specialized machinery and swept up as dew in great nets. Then I would hop out, lace up my hiking boots and stroll through a hushed, magical world where the presence of water invaded all five senses: beading on the tips of ferns, dripping rhythmically onto thick leaves, gurgling over brooks and crashing into ravines. Life sprang at me from every corner: lush green ferns, towering trees crawling with mosses, and layer upon layer of birdsong.
The scent of moss and wet wood was so thick you could taste it.
I had heard this park, and this hike, described as being out of a fairytale. Sure enough, it felt enchanted, particularly as shafts of golden afternoon light slanted in to scatter the forest with glowing and glittering vignettes. For me, though, it was reminiscent of a real-world place, too.
Growing up in Scotland, my grandparents had lived a couple of hours’ drive north, which in Scotland is considered a Very Long Drive, so we would usually stay for the weekend. My older brother, whose lack of motion sickness I greatly envied, somehow always seemed to have the latest Harry Potter book in hand for the Very Long Drive. Eventually, my dad invested in the books on tape (yes, actual cassette tapes!) so we could all listen to Harry Potter together on the Very Long Drive. And once we arrived at our grandparents’ house in Kilmun… the only way they could get the two of us away from our books and outside was to engage us in what we called “Harry Potter Walks” through a local network of hiking trails called Puck’s Glen. This ethereal place was named for the sprite from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and it provided a very plausible replica of Hogwarts’ Enchanted Forest, which formed the backdrop of the many creative and convoluted stories my brother (Ron) and I (Hermione, go figure) dreamed up for us to play out as we walked.
In fact, looking back, I’m fairly certain Harry and Hagrid (I mean, my dad and grandpa) were every bit as invested as we were.
Roamward Bound 