Hoh Rainforest Camping Site Help

[Otter]

Originally Posted by campism

Be sure to look for the shaggy phone booth while you're there.

LOL, I saw that photo when reading online reviews. So iconically PNW!
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[REF]

Things might be a bit sloppy out there with all the recent rain and flooding.

[Otter]

Originally Posted by REF

Things might be a bit sloppy out there with all the recent rain and flooding.

Ugh. My plans are really taking a hit with every news report and forecast. Dang! Must be a Murphy’s law thing that my time off so often coincides with natural disasters.

[SportyGma]

Look at camping at Mora, out by LaPush. It’s a NPS campground near Rialto Beach. You can take your dog on leash for a mile on the beach. In my opinion, it’s a much more interesting beach than Kalaloch. The campground won’t be as busy, either.

[basssears]

So I have actually spent 2+ weeks on a November tour of the Olympic Peninsula and we loved it, way less crowded and the weather was fine. But we did get lucky with the weather, that storm that rolled through was pretty epic (friends who live in Bellingham are still underwater). There are some park alerts:

https://www.nps.gov/olym/index.htm

If you do get out there, we really liked Kalaloch, I bet those campgrounds are never empty but they weren't too bad, if you stay for a few days you can slide from one site to a better one at changeover time, some of them have spots you can walk to and sit on the bluff:


(and yes, we drove from campsite to campsite with our top up, hah, I'm sure we're not the only ones). IRRC they might have shut the water off for the year (or maybe I'm misremebering) but come with full water. The beach at Kalaloch is HUGE, so you can definitely get away from the other people (and most of the folks in the campground never seemed to get down onto the beach). With no one very close to you be sure to follow that leash law obsessively

We stayed at the Hoh Rain Forest campground at the end of the Hoh Road and it was very cool. There's a small loop hike to do (no dogs this time) that was short enough didn't feel bad about leaving the dog in the van, got to see some serious moss action! Also saw Roosevelt elk. We were the only vehicle in the campground.

I will second SportyGma on the Mora Campground at La Push... very cool spot, the beach is rockier and not as big as Kalaloch but we got to hang out and watch people surf, and the campground itself is under big canopy feels pretty protected even when it's blowing and raining.

If the weather totally shuts you out from that side of the park you can head for the rain shadow, on our lap we also really enjoyed our time up by the Elwah Dam site, Port Townsend (you can camp at the marina on the point) and Port Angeles / Sequim / Dungeness Spit (great hike out the spit, no dogs though). Looks like some snow up on Hurricane Ridge but looks like the road's open.


-- Bass

[flyfisher]

The Mora campground about 17 miles out of Forks is very nice. And you have access to Rialto Beach. Kalaloch has a few very nice Ocean Front sites, but they're very close together, the rest of the campsites are pretty dismal, and very close to Hiway 101.

[Queenie]

I was supposed to camp this wk as well up in the PNW but w/ all the flooding that occurred I’m giving it a hard pass. I’m not in the mood. Multiple roads are out/closed in and around the NP.

[Otter]

Originally Posted by SportyGma

Look.

Originally Posted by basssears

So I have.
-- Bass

Originally Posted by flyfisher

The Mora ca.

Originally Posted by Queenie

I was supposed to camp this wk as well up in the PNW but w/ all the flooding that occurred I’m giving it a hard pass. I’m not in the mood. Multiple roads are out/closed in and around the NP.

Thanks everyone for your helpful suggestions. I might back off this trip till sometime in Spring and watch for a good weather window. I appreciate all the help!
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[Roamoverland]

Check to see about flood damage first. We live on the Olympic Peninsula and the west side had major flooding on Monday. Landslides, closed hwys, no water in some of the communities. Other than that, it is spectacular! And we have dispersed camped in several places, the Quinault Rainforest is our fav. Graves Creek is a great campground, but lots of the National Forest campgrounds here close in the winter, so be prepared for dispersed camping.

[Roamoverland]

We have also camped with on the Hoh river with access to the river at the boat ramp (on the park map) up the main Hoh river road.
The other suggestion is look at the campground at the South Fork fork the Hoh river. There is access to a hike that takes you through some amazing old growth forests.