Hoh Rain Forest is a popular tourist attraction at Olympic National Park in Washington. The forest receives 3 times as much precipitation annually compared to Seattle and thus grew a lot of moss on the trees. Despite the amount of moss at this location, it has attracted lot of visitors every year due to its unique forest scape.
We got to Hoh Rain Forest visitor center around 10:30 in the morning and we were so lucky to find a parking spot. As we drove to the parking lot, a car was just leaving at the same time. Then when we got out of the car, we could smell the strong odor of insect repellent that people were using.
The visitor center at Hoh Rain Forest had a lot of details on how the forest is formed. It even had a precipitation meter to keep track of the amount of precipitation that it has been receiving. Unfortunately, the forest has not even received half of its usual precipitation this year.
The hiking trail here was quite easy. Hall of Mosses and Spruce of Nature trails were only about 1 mile long with almost no elevation gain. As we hiked into the forest, we start to see very very hairy trees with moss all over it. We imagined that the tree is probably dead with the amount of moss that it has.
Some trees are covered by the moss entirely and it simply looked like a giant with legs and arms. It was quite interesting to see different figures of trees. The stream along the trail also had extremely clear water and we could see the green algae under the clear water.
As we walked back to the visitor center, we saw several people holding the junior ranger booklet to complete different tasks. Once tasks are completed and the pledge is spoken, you can get a junior range badge. This is a very interesting activity for kids to enjoy and understand the circle of life in the forest. The visitor center also offered a different set of tasks for ocean related environment and the reward is a different patch. Although the reward is for junior ranger, it is open to all ages to participate.
Overall, Hoh Rain Forest is very suitable for senior and young kids with easy trails. The kids will also enjoy the tasks to acquire junior range badge.
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