Forum Index > Trip Reports > Toleak Point, ONP 12–13 Dec 2020
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alexsidles
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alexsidles
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PostWed Dec 16, 2020 11:57 pm 
There are two ways to visit Washington's roadless coast: by backpack or by kayak. Since I hit my 30s, I've found it increasingly easier to travel by kayak. I can move faster, carry more gear, and, most importantly, reach hidden stretches of coast where hikers cannot come. There are some world-class kayaking routes on our coast that rarely get discussed in this forum, including Cape Flattery, Quileute Needles, and Cape Johnson. Despite a kayak's many advantages, if you really want to understand the coast, you have to walk it. Only while wending among the trees on foot can you sense the sheer, overwhelming mass of life that grows in these forests. Only by scrambling up the sliding bluffs can you appreciate gravity's slow drag of the earth into the sea. Inspired by posts from Slugman and others on this forum, I set out for Toleak Point on foot. To make things easier on my aching ankles, I came in by way of the DNR road north of Scott Bluff, not the Third Beach trailhead farther west. Arriving at midnight on Friday night, I was relieved to discover the DNR road in good condition, at least by logging road standards. A few of the deeper, flooded potholes might have given a low-clearance vehicle trouble, but my jeep ate them up without any problem. The road was bermed off about a mile outside the park, where I stopped and spent the night. With a little bit of gumption, it might have been possible to maneuver the jeep around or over the berms, but, as I was to discover in the morning, hopping the berms would have done scant good: the road was washed out a quarter mile beyond the first berm. From the end of the road, a foot trail in excellent condition led to the top of Scott Bluff, where it met the overland trail down to the beach. Compared to the Third Beach access, the DNR access skipped Taylor Point altogether, and the beach between Taylor and Scott, including the difficult ascent up Scott Bluff. It was the shortest and easiest route I know to the coast.
There wasn't much in the way of bird life, neither in the forest nor on the water. A few siskins, kinglets, and thrushes were the only birds I saw on the hike in. Western grebes, cormorants, harlequin ducks, and a single common murre were the only seabirds. Fortunately, the mammals stepped up to fill the gap. Just inside the park boundary, I woke a sleeping elk who crashed off into the underbrush with a terrific racket. Later, I encountered a blacktail deer high-stepping through the maximum tide at Strawberry Point. Out on the water were a pair of sea otters in Strawberry Bay, a single harbor seal hauled out in Giants' Graveyard, and at least two gray whales spouting at Toleak Point. I'd encountered the marine mammal species on many previous occasions by kayak. Watching them from land while they dived and rolled reminded me just how rich their lives are. Marine mammals live in three dimensions, while we must make do with only two. And, of course, they don't have to haul their food to Toleak in a heavy backpack! Only four other people came through Toleak the whole weekend: a young couple who camped at the point like I did, and a pair of guys who were trying to get from Third Beach to Mosquito Beach in a single day in winter. These two maniacs were wading through seawater to their waists because they couldn't afford to wait for the tide to recede, lest they be caught out at night. How the sea otters must have laughed. I forgot my water jug in the jeep, so I set up camp on the south side of the point, next to the creek so I'd have a water source. I slept on the sand below the bluff, which I much prefer to camping in the muddy, dark uplands. In the morning, a 10.5-foot tide with two-foot waves came close to but did not swamp my tent. Whether by foot or by water, there's no wilder, more beautiful place in the state than our roadless coast. Alex

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Joined: 24 Aug 2011
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PostThu Dec 17, 2020 5:13 pm 
Definitely need to add this trip to the list for next summer (or next winter!) Thanks for the beta! Also enjoyed your lengthy list of kayak trip reports up.gif up.gif

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