Last fall I visited Washington, and Rialto Beach, with Dan, Karen and Zach. The trip came about when I asked Dan where he would want to go, if we could travel anywhere in the world, and he said Seattle.

What he really wanted was to visit Aberdeen, the town outside of Seattle where Kurt Cobain grew up. (Cue my face palm.) I decided I could work with this, and negotiated a day in Aberdeen, if I could plan the rest of the trip. We spent a few days in Seattle – which I mentioned here and here – and the rest of the time road tripping the Olympic peninsula. On our way to Aberdeen. Yep, I made it the last stop to keep the excitement high all week haha!

We visited some gorgeous campsites around Olympic National Park, hiked to waterfalls and drove around the entire 101 loop. Since the whole trip was like a double date, we called it the babe-cation. The best part was the trip fell on Karen’s birthday and our anniversary so there was a lot to celebrate.

Seattle was no where near the top of my bucket list but the trip turned out to be amazing. I couldn’t imagine not seeing these places. If anything, I realized that sometimes the best adventures are the ones we don’t expect.

The most magical place for me was Rialto Beach, a rocky beach littered with drift wood. It’s not far from the Northwestern most point of the contiguous United States and a few spots, like Forks and La Push, made famous by the Twilight books.

After spending the night at Mora campground, we drove down to Rialto Beach, eager to beat the tide. It takes just over a half hour to walk north along the beach to Hole-in-the-Wall. As long as you get there around low tide you can walk through and see all the tidal pools.

If you stop to play in the waves and photograph the rocks, it takes a bit longer.

The coast is wrapped up in a misty blue haze and sea stacks jut out of the ocean in the distance. Along Rialto Beach, people balance tall stacks of rocks.

We didn’t spot any starfish in the tide pools but the bright green anemones were everywhere. Perhaps the coolest part about Washington is that even when we visited popular spots like this, there were more seagulls than people.

Once you walk through the Hole-in-the-Wall it’s literally all tidal pools. It’s pretty amazing that all of this is gone (well covered up) when the tide rolls back in. We had to watch our step, but it’s a really cool spot to explore.

After reliving the trip through these pictures, I can’t believe I almost rolled my eyes at this destination. Thank goodness for Aberdeen, because the journey there led us through here lol!