Hurricane Ridge, Olympic National Park

A couple of days ago we drove from Port Angeles, WA, to Hurricane Ridge, a mountain area at the north end of Olympic National Park. The winding, 17-mile drive ends at an almost eye-level view of mountain peaks.

We went to the Visitors Center, hiked, saw lots of deer (we've seen so many lately I've quit taking photos of them), lots of marmots (big ground squirrels) and amazing views.

As we approached the Hurricane Ridge Visitors Center, a huge cloud was going by.  It was like looking at a cloud out the window of an airplane.

Hurricane Ridge is named, obviously enough, for gale force winds the area gets -- but the day we visited it was calm and beautiful.  

Another cloud photo. The Hurricane Ridge area of Olympic National Park offers skiing and snowboarding in the winter and gets an average annual snowfall of 400 inches, says the park website. 

You can see the road we drove in the middle of this photo. The road starts  near sea level in Port Angeles and ends at the Visitors Center at 5,242 feet. 

Jim and I were trying to get a selfie with mountains in the background, when a man approached.  At first we thought he was going to offer to take a photo of us, like lots of folks do at tourist spots.  Instead he unintentionally photo bombed us.

But someone else took our photo as we hiked to a view of mountains, forests, Port Angeles, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and British Columbia.

The tallest mountain is Mt. Olympus, at 7,965 feet.