Ebey's Landing — Thursday, Jun. 2, 2022

This has got to be my all time favorite beach hike! It's not just walking the beach, but also getting high above it and into the edge of the forest and around the fields around it. We started at the parking by the cemetery, part of the National Park Preserve (loo available). The bottom part by the beach is State Park so you need your Discover Pass (loo here also). We hiked the Pratt Loop, the Kettles Spur and then followed the main trail down to the beach, and after we had a nice beach walk, we finished the hike along the bluff trail. Total of everything was approx. 8 miles.  We had some nice views of the Olys poking out of the clouds. The Sound was calm and there were a lot of cargo ships in the shipping lanes. We saw an otter, in the water, where he/she 'otter' be. One eagle, blackbirds and white crowned sparrows in abundance. Many of the flowers we found today are excapees from cultivation, vetch, clover, yellow mustard, salsify and the yellow lupine, native to CA but introduced to control erosion. Other flowers, cow's clover, catchfly, field chickweed, the usual yellow daisylike flowers, seaside dandilion, cats ear and gumweed plus lots of roses in full bloom. There was a nice section of death camas and a few brodiaea. This is a popular hike, but people seem to spread out enough for some solitude.