Sol Duc River Falls

After our hike in the rain forest we headed back to Forks for lunch and to find a laundromat. I needed to dry out my jeans. As a side note, Forks takes its name from the forks of three nearby rivers the Bogachiel, Calawah, and  Sol Duc. I am coming to appreciate the fact that many of the strange sounding words in this area are Indian words. Not surprising as there are eight Indian tribes in Washington. Sol Duc in the Sklallam language means "shining waters". As we drove into the Sol Duc river area we noticed signs pointing the way to a resort. This is the only full-scale resort within Olympic National Park and it has a hot springs bathing pool. The park lies in an area of tremendous geothermal activity. To get to the Sol Duc Falls we needed to drive into higher elevations. Consequently we went from seeing a lot of green in the rain forest to seeing the white of snow. Below is a picture of my brother hiking up toward the falls. It was still raining.

It has happened to us before that we hike out toward a scenic spot uncertain as to exactly what we are looking for. A fall of water came be anything from a small trickle running down a hillside or a thunderous wide stream flowing from high mountain cliffs. The former was the first stream of water we saw on our hike. We thought maybe that was what we were looking for. I would have been satisfied but, no, we had to hike further.

There was no question as to whether we were at the right spot when we saw the falls. They were impressive, three large streams of water spilling over large rock boulders and landing about 20 feet below into a steep cliff. It was worth the hike to see them but we had seen enough water for one day. We headed for home.