Elwha River

I hadn't been out to Port Angeles for a couple of years, but then made two trips within the last month.  The dams started coming out in fall of 2011, so this was my first chance to see the river since the long-awaited restoration began.  We were able to explore the beach at the river mouth, where all sorts of new sand is building out on the delta - sand that's been sitting in the reservoirs upstream for almost a century.


We also drove up and took a look at the lower dam - or at least the place where the lower dam used to be. The dam and powerhouse are all gone, the recontoured slopes have been planted, and the river is flowing through the narrow rocky canyon that used to buried by the dam.  Upstream of the lower dam, the Elwha is winding its way through the leftover reservoir.