Hiking the Elwha Valley Washout

Olympic Peninsula Travelog #15
Elwha Valley - Sun, 5 Sep 2021. 10:45am.

When we drove to the trailhead for our hike to Madison Falls this morning (previous blog) we saw signs of trouble. Like literally signs of trouble. "Road closed", "Bridge out ahead", and stuff like that.



A flood washed out part of the road that enters the Elwha Valley. Yes, this is the same Elwha Valley we hiked part of the trail to from 5,500' above yesterday. And which a ranger up at Hurricane Ridge told us we should be sure to visit from down below. Well, with the road gated beyond Madison Creek Falls we figured we'd walk it a little bit instead.



The walk was a pleasant one. The scenery was beautiful, with the river right beside us much of the time. And with the area blocked to cars it was quiet. We shared the road with a scattering of other hikes and a few bicyclists.



In less than a mile we arrived at the site of the washout. Yup, that bridge is totally gone!

Seeing how... weathered... the area around the washout is made us wonder how long ago it happened. We did a bit of searching online. It turns out this area has flooded twice in the past several years. It flooded in 2015, wiping out the road. The Park Service fixed it, then it flooded again in 2017 and wiped out the road again. The Park Service had plans to implement a new design by 2021 but it seems that may have been interrupted by Covid work stoppage.

Why two recent floods, BTW? For decades this valley was protected by a pair of small dams upstream. In the 1990s Congress passed an act to remove those dams and "return the area to its natural state". In 2011 the dams were fully removed. Now the area's natural state is... NO ROAD. 🙄

Up next: Marymere Falls. (The day is by no means over!)

Hiking Marymere Falls

Olympic Peninsula Travelog #16
Lake Crescent, WA - Sun, 5 Sep 2021. 1pm.

Marymere Falls is one of several waterfall hikes that were in our plan for today. One or two got chopped off the list because of the bridge out over the Elwha River, but Marymere was open. And busy. The parking lot was full, with people vulturing for spots. (Actually it was more like perch hunting instead of vulturing. Vultures circle in the sky on thermal air currents. Perch hunters sit nearby and swoop in when they see prey.)

The crowds were thick on the trail as in the parking lot. And all despite the gloomy weather. You're not going to travel all the way out here and not go hiking just because it's gloomy. Plus, if you're familiar with the Pacific Northwest you understand that gloomy = normal.

I remember Marymere being busy when we visited 13 years ago, too. Yes, we're hiking it again. It's awesome enough that it's worth visiting twice in 13 years. And yes, it was gloomy then, too. Gloomy = normal.



I'll cut to the chase... er, the falls. They're about a mile in on a relatively easy trail. The trail is nice. There are mossy, rain-forest trees, a steel footbridge over a creek, a single-file wooden footbridge over a side creek, and even a side falls; but these are all window dressing on the way to Marymere Falls.

I lugged my camera with three lenses plus my tripod on this hike. At times during the walk I regretted the extra weight and bulk, but when I arrived at the falls I was glad I did. As I set up my tripod I noticed that the photographer standing next to me had a lens filter with a recognizable brass ring on his kit. "Hey, do we have the same filter?" I asked, referring to the ND filter I use to shoot waterfalls.

He laughed and said yes, though as we started talking tech for a moment I noted he owns my filter's counterpart. Mine's a Peter McKinnon 2-5 stop adjustable filter. The other guy had the 6-9 stop adjustable filter. But still, it's hilarious that two strangers can meet in the wilderness, notice brass rings on a camera, and start talking about some photographer with a popular YouTube channel.

Up next: another waterfall! Read about Sol Duc Falls.

Sol Duc Falls

Olympic Peninsula Travelog #17
Sol Duc, WA - Sun, 5 Sep 2021. 3:30pm.

After finishing our hike at Marymere Falls this afternoon we drove a bit further west, to the Sol Duc River valley. Sol Duc is a transliteration of the native Quileute name for the river. It means "sparkling waters". On some signs it's written (improperly, IMO) as "Soleduck" because those are the two English words the pronunciation sounds like.



As with Marymere Falls earlier today I'm not going to write much about the trail itself. The hike is easy to see as a means to an end— that end being the glorious Sol Duc Falls.



"Not much" is not the same as nothing, though. I will write a bit about the trail, if only because in places like this it's important not to overlook the trail as being strictly a means to an end. Being deep in the rain forests of the Pacific Northwest is a sublime experience if you slow down enough to absorb it. Tall trees rise far above you, while the green of undergrowth glistens with drops of water. In beauty all around me, I walk.

Then you hear the falls crashing over rocks and that all recedes back into the background. 🤣



Most of the waterfalls photos I've been sharing this trip I've shot with slow exposures. That's how I get the silky, blurred effect with the flowing water. The photo I've included above doesn't have that effect. It's more like what a typical photographer shoots in this scene. It's 1/240 sec at f/5.6, ISO 800. Instead of a motion blur effect with the water you get a stop-motion effect: you can see the water in drops and blobs spraying over the falls.

I've included this picture so you can compare it to the next one, shot at the same place but with different camera settings.



This photo is shot at 1.4 seconds— an interval 336 times longer than the previous pic. I narrowed the aperture down slightly to f/6.4 and lowered the sensitivity to ISO 80.... but these two changes alone don't explain how I was able to set the shutter to stay open 336x as long. Those two settings only allow about a 11x change. The other factor of 32x came from the neutral density (ND) filter I've been writing about in many of these waterfall blogs.

Which one's better? It's a matter of taste. I'll say that the first photo is more accurate to the experience. It looks like what you see with the human eye when you are there. The second one is more art. I tend to prefer the second style (as you might have guessed from how often I employ it in the waterfall photos I share) but I'm sharing both here so you can choose for yourself.

Keep reading: MOAR Sol Duc Falls!