Seattle / Olympic National Park / Vancouver
 

Hey there,

My husband and I are considering a trip to the northwest during September. We were thinking the 5th - 14th (traveling the 5th and 14th) and wondered if it would be too much to attempt to spend 2-3 days in Seattle, 3 days in the park, and then 3ish in Vancouver...with all the driving / ferrying in between.

Google maps estimates drive / ferry time from Seattle to Lake Crescent to be 3 hours...and from Lake Crescent to Vancouver to be 4 hours, 45 minutes...so we have no idea if this is accurate. If so, we might consider altering our trip to just do Olympic and Vancouver and return and do Seattle another time.

Thanks in advance for your help and feedback!

Given that you would have to take at least 1 ferry to get from Lake Crescent to Vancouver, that doesn't sound accurate to me--I'd say it's probably at least an hour longer trip than that.

Victoria would be a much easier 3rd stop since it's a 90 minute ferry ride from Port Angeles on the peninsula.

I don't think it is too much to do. You would take the Port Townsend-Keystone ferry from the OP to Whidbey Island and drive north to Vancouver from there. The drive would be pretty and the ferry ride is nice. The ferry crossing is 35 minutes. I'm thinking the estimate of time may be correct because you can reserve now.

I think you would have to fly into Vancouver or Seattle, anyway. Actually flying to the OP would be very expensive, and you'd have to do it on some little plane that would come from Seattle, I would guess. There are no big airports there.

If you take Orcas'a suggestion check and make sure that the ferry from Port Townsend is a car ferry and not just passenger only. Seems that the car ferry has been down for a time. The trip from Port Angeles to Victoria and the subsequent vist is one of our favorites.

It is a car ferry currently and they will be taking reservations during the summer months at least.

I still think that's a 6 hour plus trip but maybe my estimates are off.

The border crossing is a wildcard. You have to make sure you aren't traveling on a US or Canadian holiday weekend. Also, I believe the biggest delays are from Canadians traveling south to shop in the US, so the big flow of traffic is southbound in the mornings, especially on wkends, and northbound in the evenings. If you hit the border crossing at the right time, there is virtually no wait.