day five: the vampire port

upon the recommendation of some friends who have a family home in port angeles, they convinced us we must head up. i did a lot of WWW research and all of the pictures confirmed that indeed we needed to visit this place. it is on the olympic peninsula right at the foot of the olympic national forrest. that morning, we took a fairy from seattle to bainbridge island and then crossed the bridge to our destination.

this was our departing picture. i would like to take a moment to plug the ferries here. think NYC subway system on a boat. you drive your little car on for $15.00 and get across the water, but you also get phenomenal views.
this is the face of 2 people wanting their own beds and missing their babies. can you tell? also the face of two cold people on the passenger open air deck. i think it was maybe 55 degrees that day, heaven!

bainbridge island. we didn't get much time to explore as we had so much driving ahead of us.

once the ferry landed, we headed first to sequim (skwim). it is the lavender capital of something or other. lots and lots of lavender. it became apparent to us that we crave beautiful architecture that creates small towns. there were some breathtaking views all around us, but the reality is, stephanie meyers based her novels in run down indian reservation towns full of double wides. there is not a lot of charm in port angeles, forks or any surrounding towns. that shock took me a full day to digest. here is a lavender field in sequim just outside of port angeles.
once we got into town we were hungry. thankfully, i did loads of research on food. there were great reviews on everything around. we chose the asian bistro for lunch/dinner that had a great wall street journal review. i thought for sure this would be the place to indulge in seafood and pad thai, seemed the place. no, not the best idea unfortunately. give me some authentic pad thai please with tofu, eggs, bean sprouts and peanuts. this was sub par. scott's was alright. he got a honey walnut prawn dish. once we checked into our bed and breakfast, bob, the owner, pointed us to the mountains. he told us we had to do hurricane ridge before the sunset. this was the drive up.
it was a full panoramic view of the olympic peninsula, i think we went from sea level to 5500 feet elev. in about 20 minutes. it was impressive and i finally felt like i could put a smile on my face.