SMACK IN THE MIDDLE of a landmass known as the Olympic Peninsula, bordered by the Pacific Ocean, Strait of Juan de Fuca, Puget Sound, and Hood Canal, is the vast, 922,650-acre Olympic National Park (nps.gov/olym). The peninsula is also home to three temperate rain forests—the Hoh, Queets, and Quinault—some of the world’s largest trees, four ecosystems, artist havens, sandy beaches, and Forks, the setting for Stephenie Meyer’s hugely popular Twilight series of vampire novels.

Traveling north on Highway 101 from Aberdeen at the southwestern base of the peninsula, we are drawn to distinct environments, including old-growth hemlock forest to explore, ocean beaches to comb, interior lakes to paddle, and thermal hot springs such as Sol Duc. The road to La Push is filled not only with Meyer’s werewolves, but trailheads leading to Rialto, Second, and Third Beach, each an excellent opportunity to wander upon a needle-strewn path beneath the cedar trees en route to an isolated beach full of driftwood and sea stacks.

While many travel to the Hoh Rain forest to explore an environment that receives more than 170 inches of annual rainfall, the Quinault Watershed is a favorite among local rangers. Producing a biomass four times that of a tropical rain forest, the Quinault is home to many deep-forest inhabitants, including cougars, black bears, bobcats, and, during the winter months, dozens of bald eagles drawn to the free-running river’s edge to feed on salmon. The peninsula ecosystems aren’t the only environments worth exploring.

The dynamic town of Port Angeles is home to artists and artisans alike, and both arrive on the weekend of October 12 during the Dungeness Crab Festival (crabfestival.org). Artists’ installations remain on display year-round inside and outside at the Port Angeles Fine Arts Center’s (pafac.org) sculpture garden. And there are plenty of outside activities: ambitious hikes in Olympic National Park, a 5.5-mile walk along Dungeness Spit to the Dungeness lighthouse, a cycle along the Olympic Discovery Trail—a paved former railroad grade along the Strait of Juan de Fuca. By pedal or foot, paddle or car, the Olympic Peninsula presents a forest aesthetic that remains among the finest in the Pacific Northwest. —CRAI BOWER