For this trip, we decided to do some car camping and day hike to Toleak Point. Unfortunately, we didn't check the tide charts before we left home and we didn't know there was going to be a weak ebb tide which wouldn't leave us enough time to get to Toleak Point and back before the tide was too high for us to reach Taylor Point on the return.

We still had a nice hike to the beach at Scotts Bluff where we saw three sea otters. The otters were very curious about us and would swim in for a closer look and then duck under the water and reappear 30 feet away. They did this for about ten minutes until the largest otter reared up out of the water and pushed the head of smaller one under the surface as if to say, "I said we are leaving!" The otters then vanished.

Most of the headlands are impassable and require hiking inland and up very steep trails assisted by ropes and wood-and-cable ladders. The ladders are usually wet and slippery and take a little care to negotiate safely. A word to the wise: avoid the gold colored clay unless you are an expert skier. The gold clay is hard and very, very slippery.

It rained amazingly hard the second night. Every time we thought it couldn't rain any harder, we were proven wrong a moment later. The tent kept us nice and dry except where the corner by my feet was in a 3 inch deep puddle and leaked a little.

The next day, we stopped at all the Kalaloch beaches. Amazingly, two of the beaches have been so little used that the trails have all but disappeared.

We experienced a lot of the typical damp Olympic Coast weather, but, as always, there were many beautiful sights to see.