20230423 Sunday, April 23, 2023; Mocrocks clamming and heading home

 20230423 Sunday, April 23, 2023; Mocrocks clamming and heading home.

We got a bit of a break from the rain in the morning as people started packing up campsites and heading out for Mocrocks beach for clamming.  We topped off our fresh water supply, stowed all our umbilicals, and joined the convoy of vehicles headed to Mocrocks beach.  We parked in pretty much the same location each time this trip within a quarter mile of the access. This time, an older Winnebago View pulled in next to us driven by a couple in their 50’s who live on Hood Canal and who bought the RV about 3 weeks ago.  They were excited about moving up to their first Class C RV, having previously camped in a towable. 

The tide today wasn’t as low as Friday or Saturday, so we had to work a little harder to find the larger clams, but ended up settling for what clams we could fine in the surf.  We still managed to get our limit of 20 clams each but did things a little differently by sending Ben back to the RV with a full bag of 20 clams to start the cleaning process while Janet continued hunting for the last 10 or so clams to make up our second limit.  

Ben had developed a technique for giving the clams an enema which helped purge a lot of sand out of most of the clams using our fresh water outside shower hose connected to a hand nozzle.  After Janet returned with the second bag of 20 clams, we started to clean process them, but ended up running out of fresh water.  

We stowed the clams in process after having shelled them and dumped the shells on the beach below the high tide line.  Then we returned to the RV park a half hour before check out time, and refilled our freshwater tank.  We then formally checked out by dropping off our parking pass, and drove down to Ocean City State Park, 6 miles to the south, where we finished processing our clams and then dumped out holding tanks at the state park’s trailer dump facility.  Our Natural Investment Pass is valid for State Park entry as well as use of the boat launches and trailer dump facilities.  

We drove home along SR 108, which was back open after the state had shut it down to do some land slide mitigation work just north of Hoquiam.  We encountered pretty heavy traffic going through Hoquiam, which was probably mostly weekend clam warriors headed home to the big cities.  Traffic was also pretty heavy approaching JBLM. 

We stopped at the Lacey Costco to return an item and pick up some AAA batteries after discovering we needed some in the RV for temperature sensors and remote controls, and topped off the fuel tank, but after paying $4.79/gal for diesel at that Costco, we subsequently discovered that diesel was actually a lot less expensive up north with Samcor selling it for $4.43/gal and even the Cenex in Oak Harbor selling it for $4.45/gal.  

We met Ciara at Chiang’s Gourmet for a late lunch, and also met with George and his family there.  Ben had some surveying equipment that he had borrowed from George that needed to be returned, so that worked out well.  We gave both live in shell clams and some cleaned frozen clam meat to the staff at Chiang’s for their meal, and they stir fried some fresh razor clams with mixed vegetables and black bean sauce for us on the house.  

We ended up doing our weekly family Zoom meeting from the RV in Chiang’s parking lot at 5pm, and then headed home racing the sun.  Janet filled her compost buckets in LaConner and we made it home at 8pm, beating the sunset by 15 minutes.  

We’ll be doing laundry and cleaning fine sand out of the RV for some time, but had a productive and fun trip to the Pacific coast in the RV, having dug up 200 razor clams.  We’ll be giving a fair number of clams to friends and family as gifts and will be expanding our clam recipe repertoire.  

20230422 Saturday, April 22, 2023; Copalis Beach Clamming Day 2

 20230422 Saturday, April 22, 2023 Copalis Beach Clamming Day 2

The later low tides made for a quick and relatively easy two limits of 40 clams in under 30 minutes.  The beach is noticeably more crowded on the weekend, but there seems to be plenty of razor clams left for the picking.  Our procedures for processing our catch has been getting more efficient with each day of additional experience, and our RV’s freezer is filling up with razor clams rapidly.  

We had to have the last of the Birdseye pasta with garlic chicken for lunch to make room in the freezer for incoming clams.  

We have taken a few mini showers during this trip, but now that our grey tank is at 2/3, and the septic system at the RV park shut down, we are taking measures to limit grey water production, including dumping some grey water into the black tank and Janet took a shower at the RV park’s shower facilities, which are extremely “rustic”.  But Janet reported that hot water was plentiful and the shower stall is very roomy compared to our tiny RV shower.  

We had decent weather while digging for clams with spotty drizzles, but as the day progressed, the rains built and became quite regular.  The rains didn’t seem to discourage more RV’s from arriving during the day.  The park is probably at 85% capacity despite the rain.

Tomorrow’s low tide is at 9:30am and is at -0.8’.  We’ll be headed back up to Mocrocks beach for that clam dig, and expect it to wet again, but we are confident of finding our limits before heading home tomorrow afternoon.

20230421 Friday, April 21, 2023; Mocrocks Beach Day 2

 20230421 Friday, April 21, 2023; Mocrocks Beach Day 2

With a later and lower low tide today (8:08am, -1.2’) it was nice to be able to leave the RV park after sunrise and drive during daylight.  The trailer that had parked within 10” of us last night had disappeared as mysteriously had it had appeared when we drew our blinds in the morning. We left the RV at 6:50am and had our two limits of 40 clams by 7:30am.  There was a light drizzle as we initially set out, but the sun broke through the clouds and we had nice weather for the rest of the morning. Janet actually said “That was fun!” As we walked back up the beach to the RV.  

We cleaned and put up our catch back at the RV park and fried up a couple of clams breaded with Krusteaz in butter for breakfast.  We took a nice walk along the Connor Creek and through Griffith-Priday state park.  The only beach access to that state park is via the same pedestrian bridge that is next to our RV park, so we circled back and walked south about a mile on the beach, hoping to spot a glass float, but only found crab molts and drift wood.

Lunch was Campbell’s chicken noodle soup and cheese sandwiches with potato chips, followed by naps.  Dinner was pasta with Alfredo and green beans, but with canned chicken from Costco instead of clams since we had already put up the clams in the freezer.  

Tomorrow’s low tide is -1.1’ at 8:50am and Copalis is open, so it’s right in our back yard.  

20230420 Thursday, April 20, 2023; Copalis Beach Clamming

 20230420 Thursday, April 20, 2023

The rain stopped during the early morning hours so we were able to walk onto the beach with overcast sky and plenty of daylight.  We headed out of our RV at 6:15am.  With the lower tide level of -0.9’ at 7:28, we were greeted by plenty of clam shows above the surf wash zone, and could afford to be picky and only go after the larger shows.  In the lower surf wash zone, we could see feeding razor clams with the tips of their siphons at the surface of the shifting fine sands and volcano like spouts as the surf washed out over them.  We each had our limits of 20 clams by 7:15am and were headed back to the RV.  We finished cleaning them and putting them up in the refrigerator by 10:15am and had time for a nice nap.  

We were fortunate to have gotten a break in the rain and wind to dig our clams because by 11am, it was raining sideways with 30-45mph wind gusts and sheets of rain.  This shook the RV and occasionally sent waterfalls cascading over the side window.  RV’s began arriving later in the afternoon. Presumably the weekend warriors who had taken Friday off work were arriving.  

We had canned chili fortified with fresh chopped razor clams for lunch.  While the clams didn’t seem to affect the flavor, they did add a bit of crunchy texture and protein.

We spent the afternoon sheltering from the wind and rain watching streaming TV within the comfort of the RV.  We had more of the Birdseye pasta with garlic chicken and toasted ciabatta rolls for dinner, this time sans clams since we had put up what cleaned clams we had in the freezer.  

The rain and wind finally stopped about 6:30pm, so Ben went for a walk along the canal that separates Copalis Beach city from the actual beach.  The canal finally turns and drains into the Pacific about 1.5 miles north of the pedestrian bridge at our campsite.  There appears to be a few ATV and 2 wheeler tracks along with the walking trail.  When Ben got back to the RV park, he was blinded by headlights next to our RV and was surprised to see a travel trailer now parked with its slide within 10” of our extended slide.  I guess we’ll be keeping those blinds pulled permanently now.  We hope we won’t be listening to their TV blaring or other noises being so darned close.  It kind of reminded us of the Viking river cruise ships tied up rail to rail in Vienna.  

Tomorrow’s clamming is at Mocrocks beach, so we’ll have to pack up, crawl under the slides to disconnect water and power early tomorrow to head out.  We just hope not to find ourselves pinned in with another RV on our other side blocking our side door.

20230419 Wednesday, April 19, 2023; Mocrocks clamming Day 1

 20230419 Wednesday, April 19, 2023

We popped out of bed and stowed all our umbilicals and headed to Mocrocks in the dawn’s twilight.  The rain was quite hard and steady through most of the night, but as we arrived at the Roosevelt beach access to Mocrocks, the rain had stopped and a few patches of sky were evident.  It was eerie seeing headlamps flashing along the waterline in the distance.  The beach was quite wet from the rain, but our RV fortunately did not sink into the hard packed sand on the upper part of the beach. 

It was in the mid 40’s so we had to dress warmly in our waders, but with the activity of clamming, we were comfortable, despite getting showered on at times. Thankfully the winds were out of the south at 10 mph and not pushing the waves up the beach.  

We had no trouble finding the clam shows with a -0.4’ tide, and could afford to be a bit picky, only going after the larger shows.  Janet’s new SMI Clam gun pro worked like a charm, proving a bit easier to work into the sand and it also required less stooping because of its longer handle.  The Da-Glo red handle is also very easy to spot on the beach.  We started digging at 6:15am when there was enough light to see without head lamps, and each had our 20 clam limits by 7:15am.  The bottom of the low tide was at 6:45am.  

We stayed on the beach with the RV slide out to process our clams, going through much of our fresh water hosing off equipment and clams.  It’s a good thing we’ll be able to refill our tank at the Copalis RV resort.  

We drove up to the Pacific Beaches state park north of the Roosevelt beach access, driving through a new seaside development called Seabrook, which looked brand new and almost had a Disney like feel with a facade covered “Downtown” zone with quaint shops and restaurants to cater to the wealthy owners of the seaside weekend homes.  The state park had 9 first come first served RV sites and about 40 other sites. All of the reservable sites were filled, but only 3 of the FCFS sites were occupied.  That was good to know that at least midweek during their off season (which ends on Memorial Day weekend) it may be possible to find an open site.  There wasn’t much more to the state park besides the camp sites and 4 small car parking spaces, but it was situated right on Mocrocks beach, so clam diggers had direct and easy access to the beach from their campsites.  The sites had power but no water or sewer hook ups. Their sites were $40/night.

We then drove back to the Copalis RV resort and registered to camp through Sunday morning.  They said the septic was being “re-engineered” and that no RV dumping or hookups beyond the handful of long term residents would be allowed, but they did mention that Ocean City state park just 8 miles south had trailer dump facilities, as did Pacific Beaches state park.  There was no discount for the loss of sewer hook up, but the sites still have power and water for $44/night.

After refilling our fresh water holding tank and taking naps, we packed up and drove down to Damon Point to do an agate walk.  The weather was cool and moderately windy, but the sun was out and it was dry.  Conditions had improved at the point where there was some exposed gravel. The last time we visited, it was covered with fine sand so there was no chance of finding any agates.  This time we came up with a couple small agates, and didn’t end up skunked.  

After returning to Copalis RV resort, we had dinner using the Birdseye frozen pasta with garlic chicken augmented with fresh razor clams, adding a little more garlic salt and pepper.  

Tomorrow’s low tide is at 7:28am and is a -0.9’ tide, and it is at Copalis beach, so we’ll be able to walk directly onto the beach from this campground in the morning.  We’ll get to “sleep in” tomorrow and hit the beach at 7am.

20230418 Tuesday, April 18, 2023; Return to the coast for razor clams

20230418 Tuesday, April 18, 2023

The WDFW (Wa Dept of Fisheries and Wildlife) just approved another week of razor clam digs. These had been quite limited earlier due to persistent red tides, but now all the major razor clam beaches have been cleared for harvest. Not only that, but the WDFW has increased the catch limit from 15 to 20 clams each.  

We left home and ran some errands around town, including topping off the LP tank in the RV, which had been reading 1/2.  Surprisingly, it took 9.17gal @ $3.16/gal. We ended up hitting the road in earnest around 10:30am.  The weather was overcast and breezy.  We stopped by Chiang’s Gourmet at 1:45pm, but it was closed on Tuesdays.  So we simply got on I-5 and made our customary Lacey Costco fuel and lunch stop. Diesel was $4.699/gal.  We picked up some snacks and a Costco pizza, as well as cashing in our Costco Executive rewards check.  The weather had deteriorated to intermittent rain.

The next stop was Dennis Company Ace Hardware in Montesano, where Janet had her eyes on a SMI Clam Gun Pro, which is the Mercedes Benz of clam guns.  We were pleasantly surprised when the clerk rung up the sale and it was for less than the sticker price because he gave us a 10% Senior discount (Yipee!).  

We arrived at the Copalis RV resort about 4:45pm, but nobody was to be found at the desk or clubhouse to check in with.  The park also appeared almost deserted with only about a dozen rigs scattered about.  So we picked out a spot and assumed that we could register in the morning.  Ben then noticed that there was a small piece of paper taped to the sewer hook up on the site saying “NO SEWER”.  Looking around, it appeared that almost all of the sites had the same thing, although a few of the larger RV’s, which appeared to be long term residents, still had their sewer hoses hooked up.  Even the designated trailer dump site had “NO SEWER” taped over the hook up.  It looks like that sewer back up we noticed last time may have gotten worse.  We’ll have to see if they offer a discounted rate since there is no sewer hook up, although the location, water and electric are all we really need.  We should be able to make it through the week and dump at the rest stop in Montesano on the way home.

The evening was notable for pretty hard rain, and winds enough to rock the RV a bit.  We’re hoping it plays out overnight because the forecast is for a less than 30% chance of precipitation at 6:21’s sunrise.  The low tide is -0.4’ @6:44 so we’ll have to set our alarm clock early. We’ll be driving up to Mocrocks for tomorrow’s opening.