Hoh River Trail: Part 2

Con't from Part 1

Bear Scratches

If there were ever four words that instantly killed morale and simultaneously made everybody jittery and anxious it was those four little words.

"Guy's there's a bear." Effffffff.

The bear was not acting aggressively and we were quite far away so we took a second to discuss our options. #1: We could try to scare it off, in the hope that it wouldn't come back later that night. #2. We could try to find an alternate path around the bear and see if there were campsites a reasonable distance from him. #3. We could backtrack and try to find another place to camp. We settled on three, which I think was absolutely the correct decision. We actually found out later that particular bear is a regular at the campsite, and while he has never attacked anybody or gotten into people's food, he's very difficult, if not impossible to scare off.

We had seen a sign for horses a ways back, but couldn't remember whether it was a sign for the horse camp or just a ford. So, we started heading in that direction. The tricky thing about the rain forest and camping is that you are required to camp in established spaces, or on the river bed. Aside from the place we hoped the horse camp was, we knew that the next camping site was 3-4 miles back. So not a great option, for a bunch of kids with tired feet.

After about one mile of back tracking we came to a place that had very easy access to the river and didn't require a lot of walking off the trail. It was the first time we'd been close enough to get to it without walking a long way through the undergrowth. Places like temperate rain forests, alpine meadows, etc. often have very fragile plant life that does not respond well to trail cutting, So rather than hope that is wasa horse camp and not a ford, we decided to head out to the river. This was a good decision, since it was in fact a ford and not a camp.

We dropped our packs and did some exploring of the river bed to try and find a place that was on high ground and sandy rather than rocky. We found a great little spot that was almost at the tree line, and surround on 3 sides by trees, but still river bed. This was crucial, camping next to water, especially if there isn't a wind break can be very cold. Not to mention, that sand sucks body heat away from you really effectively. Despite our concerns, nobody was too cold.

Prior to bedding down Chris and I told everybody that we needed EVERYTHING that had any kind of odor, including toiletries, food etc. 3 of our friends apparently didn't get the message because we were about to go hang the bear can when I asked:
"So is there anything else?"
"Weeeelll I do have a vitamin water, but it isn't opened."
"No, I'm serious guys even if it's sealed, but it has a smell we need it, we just saw a bear!"
Then another friend sheepishly steps forward...
"I've got all this unopened food in my tent."
At this point Chris and I are looking at each other like we must have somehow ended up in an alternate Universe where everybody is stupid AND deaf, but we're trying to be patient cause they're noobs. So we take everybody's stuff and go to hang the bags. Now our friend Koko had accidentally saturated his backpack with aerosol sunscreen we we had wrapped it in some backpack covers and garbage bags and we're just planning on leaving it on the ground next to the bags, but he looks at us with these pleading eyes saying "....but it's very expensive." So we end up hanging his bag as well.

Tent in lower left corner for scale.

After that we went back to the campsite to enjoy our campfire and relax. I made all the boys pee around the perimeter of our camp and we let the fire go into the late hours to help put off any predators. Our precautions weren't necessary, but it was comforting doing them. The most eventful part of the night was that our friend David, who had never camped, backpacked, anything ever, got up in the middle of the night, his tent was right next to Chris and I so we woke up when he started shining his headlamp all over the place.

He went to relieve himself and must have got a little freaked out being in the woods in the middle of the night, he came sprinting back into camp. This was irritating/hilarious for a few reasons, the biggest being that we had spent several minutes explaining that you should never run away from predators because it makes you look like prey. The other being that it was amusing to think about him getting all freaked out by the woods while peeing. But I'm a jerk.

The river bed had been pretty the evening before, but we were maybe too tired and a little to apprehensive to appreciate it. The next morning it was glorious though. The river was beautiful and the sun on the surround mountains was gorgeous. It actually made me really thankful that the bear had been where he was. If he hadn't we would have spent the night in the woods, which while wonderful wouldn't have been nearly as stunning the next day.

The walk back the next day was pretty easy and nothing really of note happened. We were all tired and foot sore. Flat terrain tends to make my feet ache. After the hike we drove back, taking a detour at Hurricane Ridge to show everybody how beautiful the mountains were. Then headed back to Seattle. All in all it was a pretty successful first overnight of the season.

Bonus: I am a banana!! ...slug.