Join a Sunday

Quiet Woods, slow Sunday photo walks in the Hoh Rain Forest, Olympic Peninsula

Tall hemlock trunks fading into white fog
Hemlocks, 8:10 am
Bigleaf maples hung with moss in a green, misty valley of the Hoh
Hoh valley, f/5.6 · 1/15
Sea stacks in fog at Ruby Beach, driftwood on the sand
Sea stacks, first light
A mossy nurse log among sword ferns, two walkers far down the trail
Nurse log

Sundays · 7:30 am PST · $90 Join a Sunday

Hoh Rain Forest · Olympic National Park · Washington

A photo walk at the speed of moss.

Every Sunday morning I take six people half a mile into the Hoh, and it takes us two and a half hours. We stop, a lot. We look at one tree until it looks back. You leave with fewer photographs than you expected and better ones than you’ve made before.

2½
hours
½
mile
6
walkers at most
140″
of rain a year

A Sunday, stop by stop · Pacific time

Half a mile, eight stops

The line on the left is the whole walk. Scroll at the pace we go; the fog lifts off each frame as you come up to it.

  1. 0.00 mi7:30 am

    Five walkers in rain jackets seen from behind on a mossy trail between huge trees

    Stop 1

    We start by standing still

    Tea at the trailhead, cameras out of their bags, everyone’s settings looked at once. Then we walk in, single file and not talking, for the first hundred steps.

    7:30 am · 0.00 mi · Walking in, Hoh River Trail

  2. 0.05 mi7:52 am

    Tall hemlock trunks fading into white fog

    Stop 2

    Hemlocks in the fog

    The fog is lowest now. Trees step out of it one by one. We stop where four trunks line up and make one frame each, slowly.

    7:52 am · 0.05 mi · f/8 · 1/8 s · ISO 400 · tripod

  3. 0.12 mi8:15 am

    Raindrops hanging from licorice fern fronds on a mossy branch, the forest dissolved in fog behind

    Stop 3

    One drop

    A licorice fern on a maple branch, and the drop at its tip. Ten minutes on one leaf teaches more than an hour of walking.

    8:15 am · 0.12 mi · f/4 · 1/60 s · ISO 800 · close focus

  4. 0.20 mi8:40 am

    Bigleaf maples draped in long hanging moss in the Hall of Mosses, white fog between them

    Stop 4

    The Hall of Mosses

    Bigleaf maples wearing club moss like coats. The light is flat and soft and perfect; it will stay that way all morning, because it’s the Hoh.

    8:40 am · 0.20 mi · f/5.6 · 1/15 s · ISO 400

  5. 0.28 mi9:05 am

    A mossy nurse log among sword ferns, two walkers far down the trail

    Stop 5

    The nurse log

    A fallen spruce with a row of young hemlocks growing out of its back. We get low, at the height of a seedling.

    9:05 am · 0.28 mi · f/11 · 1/4 s · ISO 200 · tripod

  6. 0.35 mi9:25 am

    Gloved hands holding a steaming camp mug next to a camera resting on a mossy log

    Stop 6

    Tea on the log

    Thermos round two. We pass cameras and phones and look at each other’s frames. Usually someone has seen what the rest of us walked past.

    9:25 am · 0.35 mi · The thermos, round two

  7. 0.44 mi9:45 am

    Roosevelt elk among huge mossy trunks, half hidden in fog, one looking toward the camera

    Stop 7

    If the elk come

    Roosevelt elk graze along the river most winter mornings. If they’re here, we stop, stay on the trail and let them walk past. If not, we listen for them.

    9:45 am · 0.44 mi · f/4 · 1/250 s · ISO 1600 · 200mm

  8. 0.50 mi10:00 am

    A giant spruce trunk among sword ferns, a shaft of light in the fog, a walker far down the trail

    Stop 8

    Back, slower than you came

    The same half mile, the other way, and it’s a different forest: the fog has lifted off the ground into the crowns. Coffee in Forks, if you like.

    10:00 am · 0.50 mi · f/8 · 1/30 s · ISO 400

Walks

Three ways to spend a Sunday

  • Every Sunday · 7:30 am PST (8:15 in December and January)

    The Sunday walk

    Two and a half hours, half a mile of the Hall of Mosses and the Hoh River Trail. Six walkers at most, any camera, tea included.

    $90a personBook

  • First Sunday of the month · 7:00 am

    The coast Sunday

    First light at Ruby Beach with the sea stacks and the driftwood, then the forest after lunch. About six hours, a mile and a bit.

    $150a personBook

  • Any Sunday I have free · up to four people

    A private Sunday

    The same slow walk for you and up to three others, at your pace, with the stops you choose. Good for a birthday, or a quiet proposal.

    $320a personBook

Coming Sundays

The next six

Start times are Pacific (PST). Under each is the same moment in your time, for anyone booking from far away.

  • SundayNov 15

    7:30 am PST

    7:30 am PST

    Sunrise 7:22 · Elk season on the river

    2 of 6 left

  • SundayNov 22

    7:30 am PST

    7:30 am PST

    Sunrise 7:32 · Fog forecast

    4 of 6 left

  • SundayNov 29

    7:30 am PST

    7:30 am PST

    Sunrise 7:41 · The weekend after Thanksgiving

    Full · waitlist

  • SundayDec 6

    7:00 am PST

    7:00 am PST

    Sunrise 7:50 · Coast Sunday, Ruby Beach

    3 of 6 left

  • SundayDec 13

    8:15 am PST

    8:15 am PST

    Sunrise 7:57 · Winter start time

    6 of 6 left

  • SundayDec 20

    8:15 am PST

    8:15 am PST

    Sunrise 8:02 · The shortest Sunday

    5 of 6 left

Gallery

The wall

Frames from Sunday walks, mine and my walkers’, hung the way they’d hang in a quiet room: with space around them.

A golden bigleaf maple leaf beaded with rain on dark green moss
One maple leafSpruce Nature Trail, October, 9:12 am · f/8 · 1/15 s · ISO 400
The braided Hoh River with gravel bars and a driftwood log, low cloud on the hills
The braided riverHoh River gravel bar, November, 10:20 am · f/11 · 1/125 s · ISO 200
Tiny orange mushrooms and hemlock seedlings growing from a mossy nurse log
Small things on a big logHall of Mosses, January, 8:55 am · f/5.6 · 1/30 s · ISO 800
Sea stacks in fog at Ruby Beach, driftwood on the sand
Sea stacks, first lightRuby Beach, a coast Sunday in March, 7:18 am · f/11 · 1/4 s · ISO 100
Bigleaf maples hung with moss in a green, misty valley of the Hoh
The valley floorHoh valley, February, 8:30 am · f/5.6 · 1/15 s · ISO 400

Most of these were made within a hundred steps of the trailhead. That is the point.

Elise Harlow, the photographer, in a rain jacket and wool hat, holding a small camera under a moss-draped maple
Elise, Hall of Mosses8:50 am · f/2.8 · 1/60 s · ISO 800

Your guide

Elise Harlow

I taught biology in Port Angeles for twenty-two years and walked the Hoh fast, the way you walk a place you think you know. In 2014 a knee operation slowed me to about a mile an hour. On my first walk back I stopped at a licorice fern because I had to, and saw one drop hanging off its tip with the whole forest upside down inside it. I didn’t have a camera. I came back the next Sunday with one.

The Sunday walks began in 2018 with two friends and a thermos. I live in Forks now, fifty minutes from the trailhead, and I’ve walked the same half mile more than three hundred times. It has never been the same walk twice.

Elise

Before you come

What to bring, and the rain

  • Any camera

    Including the one in your pocket. On a phone, we’ll use the long-exposure setting and lean it on a log. Half of every walk shoots on a phone.

  • A tripod?

    Nice, not needed. I carry three light ones to lend. The forest is dim, so we’ll talk about holding still, too.

  • Rain gear

    It rains here 140 inches a year. Bring a real rain jacket, waterproof shoes and a cloth for your lens. I bring the tea and a dry bag.

  • Fitness

    Half a mile, flat, mostly on a good trail, over two and a half hours. If you can stand for a while, you can come.

On weather: fog, drizzle and rain are all good days here. Bright sun is the hardest light in the forest; if we get it, we go to the river instead.

Walkers

After a Sunday

★★★★★ 5.0 from 164 reviews

  • “We flew in from Osaka for the Olympic Peninsula and booked this from home. It was the quietest two hours of our whole trip, and my favorite photographs.”

    Kenji and AikoOsaka · The Sunday walk

  • “I brought only my phone and felt silly for about five minutes. Elise showed me how to brace it on a log. The fern drop is printed on my kitchen wall.”

    Maureen T.Tacoma · The Sunday walk

  • “I photograph for a living and I walk too fast. She made me stand at one tree for twenty minutes. Best frame I made all year.”

    Daniel O.Portland · A private Sunday

Journal

Notes from the last three Sundays

  1. Sunday, November 8

    Fog to the ground until 8:40, then gone in about four minutes, as if someone opened a door. Six walkers, one from Osaka. We made it 0.4 miles. Nobody minded.

    0.4 mi · fog, then soft sun

  2. Sunday, November 1

    Rain all morning, an inch and a bit. The best moss of the year, every strand lit from inside. Eleven elk crossed the river trail at 9:52 and we stood very still.

    0.5 mi · steady rain · elk

  3. Sunday, October 25

    The first maple leaves down. Ana from Tacoma photographed one leaf for forty minutes and got it. I think that is the whole idea, written on a leaf.

    0.3 mi · drizzle

Where

The Hoh Rain Forest

We meet at the Hoh Rain Forest Visitor Center, at the end of the Upper Hoh Road, 18 miles off US 101. From Forks about 50 minutes, from Seattle about four and a half hours.

© OpenStreetMap contributors
Hoh Rain Forest Visitor Center Olympic National Park, Washington. Meet by the trailhead at the start time. Open the map

Questions

Asked on the trail

Why only Sundays?

The trailhead is quietest early on a Sunday, and I keep the rest of the week for my own work and for the forest. One walk a week means I come to it fresh.

What time zone are the times in?

Pacific time: PST in winter, PDT from March to early November. The coming Sundays above also show each start in your own time.

What if it rains?

It will, probably. Rain is the point: the moss glows and the light goes soft. I only cancel for a windstorm or if the Upper Hoh Road closes, and then your deposit comes back or moves to another Sunday.

Do I need a park pass?

Yes. The Hoh is in Olympic National Park, so there’s an entrance fee at the gate; an annual pass works too. The line can be long in summer, which is one reason we start early.

Where do I stay?

Most walkers stay in Forks the night before, about 50 minutes away, or at a campground along the Hoh. There’s little to no phone signal at the trailhead, so I send everything the day before.

Can children come?

From twelve, with a parent on the booking. Slow is hard for most kids; the ones who like it are wonderful at it.

Book

Join a Sunday

Choose a walk and a Sunday, and how many of you are coming. $30 holds each place; the rest is paid at the trailhead. I text you the forecast and what to wear on Saturday.

Sundays only · 7:30 am PST (8:15 in December and January) · six walkers at most

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