A kayaker's guide to clams, campfires, s'mores and stars
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ON WILLAPA BAY, Pacific County - The terns were having a sunset dinner, diving into the shallow waters, plucking out fish and swooping upward. Our stomachs were troubled by the thought that our dinner was at least 90 minutes away - a two-mile paddle, followed by setting up camp.
But the beauty of Willapa National Wildlife Refuge was distraction enough to keep our thoughts from dwelling too long on campfire cuisine.
Our destination was Long Island, a tree-shrouded, bottle-opener-shaped chunk of land visible from Highway 101 north of Ilwaco.
The bay is famous for its oyster and clam beds, which were harvested by Chinook Indians for generations before the first European settlers arrived on this part of the Pacific Coast.
It is also famous for its mudflats (hence the shellfish), which make understanding tides and currents an important element in navigating and landing on the 5,000-acre island.
We put our kayaks in at the boat launch next to Willapa National Wildlife Refuge headquarters on a late June day with some of the summer's lowest tides. There were just two other cars in the parking lot - a sure sign that Long Island, despite its beauty, is one of the region's lesser-known jewels.
We hugged the shoreline looking for markers indicating the first of the three primitive campgrounds located on the island's west side. A quick depth check indicated we were floating on less than three feet of water. Old pilings about 100 yards out were probably placed there in the days of pre-sonar shipping. Soon, we rounded High Point, the southern tip.
"Looks like someone got here before us," said my kayaking friend, Jay Robertson. "How far is the next campground?"
The next camping site was a scant mile further north, but with impending twilight and the call of dinner, we dismissed the idea of paddling on.
To reach the nearer site, Pinnacle Rock campground, we portaged our two laden kayaks across what seemed like two miles of mudflats. Kayaks are to land what bicycles are to water: pretty much useless. And because Long Island can be dry in summer, our boats were made heavier by the many gallons of water we'd packed.
No sooner had we hauled the second boat up the shore than the other campers inquired if we might like to join them for clams and oysters.
"No, we don't like that. We couldn't possibly accept an offer like that," Jay joked. "When do you want us?"
We cheerfully put up the tent, hardly believing our good fortune to have peace, quiet, beauty and a prepared dinner. The terns could keep their fish.
Chena and Nick Weitzer, their 20-year-old son, Alex, and his friend, Bruno Precciozzi, had canoed and hiked in the previous day laden with a pantry's worth stuffed into a couple of coolers. To this they had added a bounty of fresh clams and oysters from the nearby tidelands.
They steamed the manila clams in garlic butter and wine, and roasted the oysters on an open fire. We chipped in with couscous and a tart ale from La Conner. Nick has been coming to Willapa Bay from Portland for more than 30 years.
We sat around the campfire, pointed out stars, Mars and speeding satellites while sharing s'mores and cookies in the bug-free night. Only the few distant lights of Oysterville broke the natural darkness.
Survival of the wettest
The high tide lapped five feet from the door of the tent, and the gentle spray of rain finally gave way to a heavier downpour in the wee hours.
Rainfall seemed fitting here on the edge of what once was the world's greatest temperate forest. Next day we planned to visit remaining examples of the giant cedars and hemlocks that once were as common as seaweed along the Pacific Coast.
Writing in "Wintergreen: Listening to the Land's Heart," Robert Michael Pyle described the Willapa coastal area as a "land sandwich: soggy on one side, crusty hard on the other, all-veg in the filling."
Willapa Bay remains one of the best-preserved intertidal basins in the Western United States. It supports an oyster industry that produces a quarter of the U.S. output.
The area gets 60 to 80 inches of rain a year, which creates that verdant filling of hemlock, cedar, fir, salal, huckleberry, ferns and alder that thrive within the protected shores of Long Island. Of course, the island was not always a sanctuary under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. After the first non-native settlers (around 1878) depleted the oyster beds, logging began on Long Island. By 1937, the Willapa National Wildlife Refuge was established, but it took another 56 years until loggers finally departed and the entire island came under public ownership.
Among areas spared the saw is a 274-acre grove of giant Western red cedars. We hiked four miles in the rain to reach the grove, home to a wide variety of birdlife, as well as bats, raccoons, black bear, Roosevelt elk and red-backed salamanders, which were much in evidence. Earlier, we had seen a bald eagle swoop over.
The walk had generated enough appetite for lunch and, agreeably, the weather had begun to let up. The sky was 14 shades of pewter backlit with just a hint of sunlight. We took that as a favorable omen for our planned exit. On the other hand, the low tide was about as far away as it might be.
Clams to go
Our campsite friends had inspired us to go looking for clams to take home.
We found our hands to be excellent implements for scooping up the shellfish bounty. I was a neophyte at clamming, but Jay assured me it wasn't usually this easy. We probably shared the same smug satisfaction of pioneers who arrived to settle Diamond City, a brief shantytown on the island, in 1867.
When finally we loaded up our kayaks for the return leg, water had finally enveloped Pinnacle Rock, a small outcrop about 150 yards from the campsite.
The weather radio had warned us of impending thunderstorms, and we had just finished loading the kayaks onto the car roof when a dark cloud roiled through, dumping the heaviest downpour of the weekend.
IF YOU GO
Long Island is on the east side of Willapa Bay in southwest Washington. From Seattle, it's a four- to five-hour drive via Interstate 5 to Olympia or Chehalis. An alternate route is to take a ferry to Bremerton and drive via Shelton.
There are five primitive campsites dotting Long Island's coastline. Campsites are available on a first-come basis; camping is not permitted outside the designated sites.
Long Island forms part of the Willapa Bay Marine Trail, a network of campgrounds that allows multi-day trips by kayak, canoe and beachable sailboats.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which administers the Willapa refuge, encourages visitors to make day trips. Whether staying overnight or for a day, you will need your own boat for transportation across the narrow channel that separates the island from the mainland. Tides, currents and extensive mudflats require that boaters make careful preparation. You can pick up tide tables at stores in Raymond and South Bend. USFW provides a free guide that shows the location of campgrounds, the 12 miles or so of roads, as well as the cedar trail.
Willapa National Wildlife Refuge office: 360-484-3482
Tourism information: www.visit.willapabay.org
Washington Water Trails Association: www.wwta.org
Gordon Black is a free-lance writer who lives on Bainbridge Island.