Someone suggested that the slideshow links from my trip aren't really easy to find so...
HERE IS THE 3rd SLIDESHOW LINK!
It's funny because this is Marcus's least favorite of the 3 slideshows, and it's my favorite. I had a really hard time narrowing down the photos from the beach so it is a bit repetitive, and there aren't any cute animals. The beaches were really gorgeous though.
Our first night in Forks, we took the short hike through the woods to Second Beach for sunset. The beach is sandy with a really unique arch. Unfortunately, it was a cloudy day so sunset wasn't as colorful as I'd hoped. Other than a few others taking pictures, the beach was empty, and the walk back to the car through the dark forest was a little creepy - especially when the bats started swooping all around our heads.
We visited Ruby Beach in the middle of the afternoon which is usually my least favorite time of day for photos. It had more rocks than Second Beach and was very crowded, but it's easily accessible down a wide, steep path from the parking and is probably beautiful at sunset.
Rialto beach was my favorite, but that may have something to do with the fact that we had a clear sunset while visiting. It is covered with little pebbles and had large waves. You can park just a few feet from the beach, and there's a public bathroom. The beach was crowded, but we walked down the beach and away from most of the people. The only thing that I didn't like was that the beach pretty much disappears at high tide. I was afraid that we would be have to walk back through the twisted stack of tree trunks that lines the beach (a VERY difficult task even in daylight), but we didn't.
We did visit several places on our trip and feel like we had a good overview of the area. For a really romantic, relaxing vacation, you may want to go somewhere that involves a little less traveling around. However, if you're like me and have a hard time sitting in one spot, I think this is a great little trip. I don't really feel like we missed anything major, and we didn't feel too rushed either.
My least favorite part was probably Vancouver, but Victoria and the whale watching are fun. The alternative is to just take the ferry over to Victoria and back from Port Angeles which doesn't seem as productive.
Here's our itinerary:
Day 1 - arrive in Seattle
Day 2 - tour Seattle (Pike Place Market, Museum of Flight, Space Needle)
Day 3 - Boeing factory tour, drive to Vancouver (Stanley Park)
Day 3 - Grouse Mountain, ferry to Victoria
Day 4 - whale watching, ferry to Port Angeles
Day 5 - Hurricane Ridge, drive to Forks by way of Crescent Lake, (can visit Sol Duc here but we took a nap instead), sunset at Second Beach
Day 6 - Hoh Rainforest, Ruby Beach, Sol Duc, sunset at Rialto
Day 7 - return to Seattle (chance to do anything you missed out on before)
Day 8 - Fly home