A Washington / Oregon road trip is the dream of travelers around the world. From mountains to beaches, cities to small towns, this itinerary down the coast is easy and features National Parks, wine country, waterfalls and the best cheese. A road trip through Washington and Oregon is so much fun, and it’s so easy to plan! Our itinerary from Seattle to the Oregon/California border is ideal for anyone looking to experience the best of the Pacific Northwest. With stops in Mount Rainier National Park, the famous Columbia River Gorge, Willamette Valley wine country, and the Oregon Coast, this road trip is full of family adventure.
The best places to visit on a Pacific Northwest road trip, including Oregon, Washington, and Vancouver, BC.
Small Town Washington & Beyond is the travel resource to discover the best small towns, outdoor adventures, foodie finds and unique accommodations.
Oregon is one of my favorite road trip destinations. It is home to some of the most beautiful coastline, mountains, waterfalls, lakes, and hot springs in the United States! To help you explore it for yourself, I've put together a comprehensive Oregon 7 day road trip itinerary. You will also find optional add-ons in case you want to extend your trip, a packing guide, my top road trip tips, and more! There are so many places to explore in Oregon and in this blog post I have put together an Oregon road trip itinerary based on what I personally think
I’m guessing you’re here because you’re adventurous too. You probably don’t have much vacation time. And you likely are a fan of road trips. Well, welcome. Me too. I work with the flights I can get, and I work with a PACKED schedule. But, if you’re here looking for ideas of things to do – don’t worry, it’ll all be listed for you too. I’m working to visit all 50 states. Maybe not anytime soon, but it will happen eventually. I was looking at where to use my flight credit left over from well, the pandemic, and Seattle was my best bet. I’m not a big city gal. I can enjoy traveling the occasional city, but I much prefer to be able to get out into nature and small towns. That’s where the heart of the state lies. OVERVIEW OF THE ITINERARY: Day 1: Seattle —> Olympic National Park, Mt. Ellinor Day 2: Olympic National Park: Rialto Beach & Mt. Storm King —> Portland Day 3: Portland (and across all of Oregon) —> Boise, Idaho Day 4: Idaho Hot Springs (3 of them!) & Boise, Idaho Day 5: Leavenworth, Washington Day 6: North Cascades National Park Day 7: Kangaroo Farm & Snoqualmie —> Seattle Naturally, Washington state is filled with national and state parks. It has nature and a massive city scene that lies in Seattle. But I was looking at the national parks. Well, I didn’t want to spend all my time in these parks. So, I thought, where else can I go? Obviously, the Oregon coast is incredible, but if I did the Oregon coast, I would want to go the Redwoods in Northern California. I tried and tried to make it work, but I eventually thought – that’s for another trip. I knew I still wanted to see Oregon and it was only a couple of hours from Seattle. But, that would leave Idaho all alone for another trip, and I wasn’t quite sure if that was worth an entire trip. SPOILER ALERT: IT IS. So, I embarked on creating an unforgettable road trip through Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Here’s how it went: DAY 1: Seattle —> Olympic National Park: Mt. Ellinor We arrived into Seattle in the morning and immediately went to get our rental car. This was at the other, smaller, airport. There is apparently a shortage of rental cars right now. Since I was nice on the phone with the company when they told me I might not get a car, they actually ended up bumping me up and the list and giving me a free upgrade! So, we got our car and set straight for Olympic National Park. This is about a 2 hour drive to the East side of the park. Hotels were also all booked up so we just figured it would be easiest to stay in Olympia, where that wasn’t a problem. We drove around the little peninsula coming from Seattle and stopped at a Walmart. PRO TIP FOR SAVING MONEY: Stop at a Walmart and get all the snacks and things you will need! This could include road trip snacks, on-the-go meals, hygiene products, or even clothes! We also decided to just eat from the hot bar there to save time and $$$. We then headed to Olympic National Park. You DO NOT need a park pass for Olympic! The park is so huge that there is no formal entrance (at least on the main ring that circles it!). We drove down through Hoodsport, WA and around Lake Cushman. This leads to the Mt. Ellinor Trailhead. Mt. Ellinor Trail Mt. Ellinor is a long drive straight uphill, but wow, it’s so worth it. There were only 2 other cars when we pulled in, and we were essentially above the clouds! And yes, at the end of May, there was snow. We hiked straight uphill through the classic tall, super green forest – and right into the snow. Thankfully, my travel friend brought contraptions for this! When I say snow, I mean, even the experienced hikers in front of us had to turn around. Because the trail was straight uphill, it got snowier and snowier as you went. And then we were really in the clouds. There were FEET of snow, and as Tennessee gals, this was incredible to us. We hiked as far as we could, and then we frolicked in the snow – really taking it all in. There was so much snow, we built a little snowman for the next hikers to see, and we headed back down. We went as far as we could go, but we realized it was way over our skill lever – so please know your strengths and weaknesses!! I will say, however, that the view is supposed to be incredible if you go in the summer. Don’t sleep on this trail! It is not crowded, and it is everything that you think of when you think about Washington. It was a great first day in Olympic National Park, and it was time to head back down. Lake Cushman/Hoodsport, WA As you head back down the mountain, you drive along Lake Cushman, and it’s honestly gorgeous. It looks like a beautiful summer getaway destination where people put their vacation homes. Not too far after you pass Lake Cushman, you’ll enter into Hoodsport (you also get a view of this on your way in to get ideas of what you want to do after!). Hoodsport is honestly a very cute town, and it sits alongside the Hood Canal. It’s incredibly beautiful. We stopped there to get some souvenirs since we didn’t know where we would have time to stop. They had a cute strip on the main road that had a bright yellow souvenir-type shop, as well as a gift and liquor store. If we weren’t so tired and had more time…they even had a distillery and winery on the same little strip! Also, now that I’m thinking about it, they also had a little place to eat on the corner where the sign reads: “Burgers Teriyaki Ice Cream.” Interesting combo, but the place is called Burger Stand if you want to tell me how it is. We headed straight to Olympia after. We didn’t even really realize that Olympia is the capital, so upon driving in, we actually drove past so many beautiful buildings and even the state capitol building. Our hotel was even on the water. We were so exhausted after traveling all day and hiking that we literally got Wendy’s for dinner and went straight to sleep. But, please note that there are lots of cute places to eat and drink on the downtown strip! DAY 2: Olympic National Park: Rialto Beach & Mt. Storm King —> Portland The next day, we woke up super not bright but super early to head all the way to the west coast. We drove to Rialto Beach in Olympic National Park at the crack of dawn to finally touch our toes in the Pacific Ocean. The fastest route was on the south side of the park, all around the loop. We only made one stop and that was at “Big Cedar Tree.” I would try to explain where that is, but apparently there are a lot of “Big Cedar Tree”’s. That’s when we made it to our first stop: Forks. Yes, the location of Twilight. It was honestly hilarious the way they really leaned into the theme that they know people come there for. The Visitor Center of Forks had pictures of Edward, Bella, and Jacob in the window. When you get towards the side of town that leads to La Push, there is a “Treaty Line” that says no vampires allowed. There is a sign that shows the vampire threat level of the day. It’s really quite fun to see. Rialto Beach We then headed towards La Push/Rialto Beach. The drive there is pretty, but the rocky west coast is beautiful. There is a short hike alongside the coast on Rialto Beach that leads to the “Hole-in-the-Wall.” It is a massive rock with a hole in it that you can walk through. The whole hike there is on the beach. Wear the right shoes! We wore Chacos, but even that was hard at times. The sand is quite rocky and very uneven. But, we still did it! We wanted to walk partly in the water, so those were the ideal shoes for us. But, it was quite the workout. We took pictures on the rocky shore, hiked along the beach, and my friend even got in the Pacific Ocean. This hike was crowded for sure. This is definitely one of the more popular areas to go, but if you get there early, it’s better! The parking is crowded, but again, if you get there early you can find a spot. And they have a bathroom there! Mt. Storm King After we were done with that hike, we drove to Mt. Storm King. The trailhead was a little confusing, but after driving around for a bit, we found it. It drops you off in a large parking lot/campground-looking area. We thought the trailhead was by the ranger station, but we drove off to the left instead and parked near a little trail to Lake Crescent (named something like “Moments in Time” on Google Maps). It was way less crowded and a short walk to the trailhead. If you see the little cabins, the exact opposite direction is where you will find the trailhead. There are no distinct Mt. Storm King signs, but if you start at the Marymere Falls trailhead, you will eventually (one way leads under a bridge!) come to the fork where you start hiking straight up the Mt. Storm King trail. When I say straight up, I mean STRAIGHT UP. I was not prepared. The entire hike is uphill, and the end of the hike requires that you climb up the side of a mountain entirely covered in dirt. This part utilizes a rope and this rope is used for people to climb up AND down. The same rope. I opted out of this part. Hey, maybe that makes me a bad travel blogger, but I just couldn’t trust the rope. Groups had to shout up and down to each other so that the people coming up didn’t run into the people coming down and vice versa. It was quite entertaining to watch – my friend did the rope part and got an incredible view out of it, and I got to sit, get some sun, and people watch while hoping no one fell. The Drive to Portland After the hike, it was time to get on the road. We had a super long drive to Portland and we had been up since before the sun. The hike down the mountain was obviously much quicker. We finally realized why we were seeing so many people running down the trail – gravity forces you to move much quicker sometimes than you might want. After making it back to the car, I wondered down a short, grassy trail that led right to the shore of Lake Crescent. Lake Crescent is pretty famous (for both beauty and scary reasons), but nonetheless it has the clearest blue-green water. The mountains surrounding the lake were like nature’s skyscrapers that I had just climbed and seen the water from a distance. If you don’t have time to hike, definitely still stop at Lake Crescent. After a brief lost phone mishap, we were making our way towards Portland – but not without a pit stop at McDonald’s in Port Angeles for a quality meal after hiking for hours that day. The drive to Portland was about 4 and a half hours from Mt. Storm King. We stayed in a not-so-nice hotel right at the state line, but hey it was a bed to sleep in. We arrived late that night, got our stuff in the hotel, and...
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Oregon is one of my favorite road trip destinations. It is home to some of the most beautiful coastline, mountains, waterfalls, lakes, and hot springs in the United States! To help you explore it for yourself, I've put together a comprehensive Oregon 7 day road trip itinerary. You will also find optional add-ons in case you want to extend your trip, a packing guide, my top road trip tips, and more! There are so many places to explore in Oregon and in this blog post I have put together an Oregon road trip itinerary based on what I personally think
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Small Town Washington & Beyond is the travel resource to discover the best small towns, outdoor adventures, foodie finds and unique accommodations.
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