The Olympic Peninsula is the large arm of land in western Washington state of the USA, that lies across Puget Sound from Seattle. It is bounded on the west by the Pacific Ocean, the north by the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the east by Hood Canal. Cape Alava, the westernmost point in the contiguous United States, and Cape Flattery, the north-westernmost point, are on the peninsula. The Olympic Peninsula contained many of the last unexplored places in the lower 48. It remained largely unmapped until Arthur Dodwell and Theodore Rixon mapped most of its topography and timber resources between 1898 and 1900.
Dungeness Spit is a 5.5-mile long sand spit jutting out from the northern edge of the Olympic Peninsula in northeastern Clallam County, Washington into the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It protects Dungeness Bay. The Dungeness Spit is entirely within the Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge and home of the Dungeness Lighthouse. It is the longest natural sand spit in the United States. Its land area, according to the United States Census Bureau, is 1,271,454 square meters. The lighthouse once was run by United States Coast Guard, but since an automatic light was installed, it has been run by the "New Dungeness Lighthouse Organization". The spit is open to the public year around.
La Push is a small unincorporated community in Clallam County, Washington, United States. It is home to the Quileute tribe and is located along the Quileute River. La Push is known for its whale-watching and natural beauty. The name La Push is an infusion of the French la bouche, meaning "mouth", into Chinook Jargon. It describes the town's location at the mouth of the Quileute River. Immediately offshore is a consortium of battered islets and sea stacks known as the Quillayute Needles. Crying Lady Rock is the largest of the batch. These forbidding landmarks are part of the Quillayute Needles National Wildlife Refuge. Inhospitable to humans, they're productive breeding grounds to thousands of seabirds, oystercatchers, murres, gulls, petrels, cormorants, and auklets among them. Just south of the village of La Push are three Olympic Coast charms:
First, Second, and Third Beaches. Each one is sandy and broad and hemmed in by dramatic bluffs and headlands.
Ruby Beach is the northernmost of the southern beaches in the coastal section of Olympic National Park. ike virtually all beaches on the northern coast, Ruby Beach has a tremendous amount of driftwood. It is notable for the number of sea stacks there.
Forks is a city in Clallam County, Washington with a population of 3,532. It is named after the forks in the nearby Quillayute, Bogachiel, Calawah, and Sol Duc rivers. For many years, the city's economy was fueled by the local timber industry. With recent declines in the industry, Forks has had to rely on the nearby Clallam Bay Corrections Center and Olympic Corrections Center as a source of jobs. Forks is a popular destination for sport fishers who fish for salmon and rainbow trout in nearby rivers. It is also supported by visitors to Olympic National Park. The city has gained popularity for being a key setting in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series.
The Olympic Peninsula is home to temperate rain forests, including the Hoh, Queets, and Quinault.
The Hoh Rainforest is located on the Olympic Peninsula in western Washington state, USA. It is one of the few temperate rainforests in the U.S., and also one of the largest. Within Olympic National Park, the forest is protected from commercial exploitation. Annual precipitation ranges from 141 to 165 inches. Summers are relatively dry, but only by comparison to the rest of the year. Many unique mosses and lichens are also present in the rainforest, such as lettuce lichen (Lobaria oregana), which "requires the cool, moist conditions found under the canopy of old-growth forests" and is consumed by deer, elk, and other animals. Roosevelt elk named after U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, occur in the Coast Range, the Olympic Range, and other areas west of Interstate 5. Olympic National Park in northwest Washington holds the largest number of Roosevelt elk living anywhere (about 5,000). This subspecies is the state mammal of Washington.
