Skip to content
Jada Bascom Foundation
Donate to JBF
Back to The Marrow Walk
Hood Canal

Day 38 · Completed

Potlatch

Waterfront at Potlatch, US Highway 101, Mason County, Washington

Potlatch at Hood Canal’s Great Bend

This day on the route

Date
The day
Walking
Walked
10.3 miles

Day 38, October 14: 10.3 miles walked, from the Glen Ayr Canal Resort through Hoodsport and Potlatch into the Skokomish Valley, then back to a cabin at the Waterfront at Potlatch. Park facilities do not constitute a booked gathering.

Route overview, not turn-by-turn directions.

A curving road passes a coral-roofed building above driftwood-strewn tidal flats, golden grass and blue water beneath wooded hills, painted in gouache.
Illustration inspired by Potlatch State Park, US Highway 101, Mason County, Washington.

On October 14 Jeana walked from the Glen Ayr through Hoodsport and Potlatch and on into the Skokomish Valley, 10.3 miles in all, and spent the night in a cabin at Potlatch, safe from the bears.

State Parks places Potlatch at Hood Canal’s Great Bend. Its history describes a postwar increase in waterfront development and local concern about losing public access. The park was one response to that pressure, preserving shoreline for public recreation.

The official park brochure describes 5,700 feet of Hood Canal shore, a longer reach of public waterfront than the small shore at Triton Cove that she passed two days earlier. Both offer a view of how public parks became part of the canal’s developed coastline.

At the Hoodsport Coffee Company a stranger paid for her latte, and Amy, who works there, visited with her on her break. She walked on through Potlatch into the Skokomish Valley, where a bear had been seen two nights running, and a woman at the tribal police office urged her not to camp. Amy brought her the day’s tips, and with her help Jeana went back to Potlatch, where the Foundation covered a little cabin at the Waterfront.

From the road

Coffee and kindness in Hoodsport, a warning about bears in Skokomish, and a cabin at Potlatch

She left the Glen Ayr Canal Resort with clean clothes, feeling refreshed. The day’s walk wasn’t very long, but she would have to add the 4.4 miles from the day before at the end of it. It was just over a mile into Hoodsport proper, and she stopped at the Hoodsport Coffee Company to see whether she could get some breakfast.

As she reached the door, a gentleman already going in held it for her, and while she took off her pack he went up to order. When she explained to the woman at the counter what she was doing, she learned that the gentleman ahead of her had paid for her coffee, and the woman was happy to give her some breakfast too. She ordered a cheese-and-jalapeño bagel with cream cheese, along with the latte that generous gentleman had paid for.

One of the staff, Amy, visited with her on her break. Amy is new to the area and came to this beautiful part of the Olympic Peninsula to start a fresh life.

She walked from Hoodsport to Potlatch and from Potlatch to Skokomish, a little under five miles, and once in Skokomish she began looking for somewhere to stay. She came across the Skokomish Tribal Police office and stopped to ask whether there was somewhere safe to put her tent.

A very nice woman there worked hard to find her a place, but most of her ideas were in Shelton, where Jeana was headed the next day. She also warned her not to stay in a tent: it was the time of year when bears fatten up for their winter hibernation, a bear had been in town the last two nights, and a pair of cougars had been spotted as well. Some of the officers were out looking for the bear as they spoke.

Just then a text came from Amy: “I have something for you, where are you?” Amy was just down the road, so she came over to the police station and handed Jeana her day’s tips. Part of her didn’t want to take them, Jeana says, but the offering was so genuine that it would have been unkind not to accept it, and she was so moved that Amy wanted to share with the Jada Bascom Foundation.

The places the police had found for her were 12 miles ahead of her walk; if that had been the only option, she would have gone and come back to walk those miles. But she and Amy worked out that there was a motel just two miles back, so back to Potlatch she went, with Amy’s help. The Waterfront Hotel at Potlatch had a little cabin free, and the Foundation covered her night there, safe from the bears and the cougars.

The nearest place to eat was 2.4 miles back in Hoodsport, so after dropping her things at the cabin she walked back to El Puerto de Angeles Family Mexican Restaurant, where they very generously offered her an enchilada meal: exactly what she needed to nourish body and soul. Afterwards a young woman picking up a to-go order gave her a ride the 2.4 miles back to the Waterfront Hotel, which was perfect. She would still have to walk the two miles back into Skokomish, but she would have made up her 4.4 miles. With dinner done, she was ready to settle in for the evening.

All along her journey, from the very first steps out of Seattle, she has found blackberries ripening on the bushes beside the highway, and she has snacked on them all the way through Washington and in Canada too. She hasn’t seen a ripe one for three days now, and a friend told her to be careful: at this time of year the bears are getting ready to hibernate, and they love blackberries. You might run into a bear, he warned her, while you’re munching on blackberries.

It was one of those connections that opened doors to new ideas and possibilities.

Jeana Moore
A narrow highway with a wooden guardrail curves along a steep bank above the water, beneath tall evergreens and a pale morning sky.A bare, twisted branch leans out over calm grey water toward a far wooded shore under a cloudy sky.A black hoodie printed with the Hoodsport Coffee Co. logo, a figure sipping from a cup, and the words “Community Through Coffee.”A green-and-white “Vote YES for Libraries” sign hangs in a shop window above a planter of dark green leaves.A mural on a grey cinder-block wall maps Hood Canal as a bright turquoise ribbon, with a red octopus painted beside it, above a strip of grass and stones.A vintage Volkswagen Beetle painted in sunset colours with palm trees and the words “Welcome to the Beach” is parked beneath autumn trees.A gravel path leads into a forest of ferns and tall trees, past a huge mossy stump.Calm dark water reflects the sky between a tree turning orange on the left and a wooded point on the right, with the bay opening beyond.Roadside yard art: a wooden Minion figure in a grass skirt holds up a “Danger Zone” sign beside a hand-painted board covered in cartoon figures, under leafy trees.A narrow paved path runs along a sunny bank lined with tall, leaning fir trees under a blue sky, with water glinting through the branches.A close-up of small, bright blue lobelia flowers with white centres.A roadside sign with a scrolling display for El Puerto De Angeles Family Mexican Restaurant and its phone number stands above a sign for Nightingale Realty.
Show all 16 photos from this dayShow fewer photos
A small brown cabin with green trim, a little porch with chairs and wooden steps sits on gravel among trees.White water rushes down a narrow creek between banks thick with ivy and ferns.Through overhanging branches, the bay lies smooth and pale under a peach-coloured evening sky, with a wooded shore across the water.An old stump rises from still evening water near the shore, with houses, docks and wooded hills reflected along the far side under a pale sky.
Distance walked
10.3 miles
Find your official registryDonate to JBFSee every stop

Choose where you live

Continue to the official registry that serves you. It decides eligibility, handles registration and contacts you if you may match a patient.

United States — NMDP

NMDP accepts new registry members who are 18 to 35, live in the US, its territories or freely associated states, can meet NMDP’s health guidelines, and are not already registered through another US organization. Joining happens at home: you answer a few questions on NMDP’s site, they mail you a free cheek-swab kit, and you swab and send it back. Once you are a member you stay listed until you are 61 unless you ask to be removed — 61 is when NMDP takes you off, not an age at which you can join. NMDP makes the final eligibility decision.

Check the listed age range

Visit NMDP

NMDP — Join the registry · checked Sep 1, 2026

Prefer to text? Send JADA to 61474 and NMDP will take it from there.

Browse all official registry options

Eligibility rules can change. Confirm the current requirements with the official registry before joining.

Give to the Jada Bascom Foundation

Choose a symbolic amount or enter your own in Givebutter. Your donation supports JBF’s work wherever it is needed most.

Sponsoring a mile, a day or a stop is a way of describing a gift to the Jada Bascom Foundation. It does not purchase anything on the route.

$100.00 is a suggested amount. Confirm or change it in Givebutter.

Donate through Givebutter

Donate without the embedded form

Sources

Local history and background reading for this stop.

  1. Potlatch State Park history — checked Sep 5, 2026
  2. Potlatch State Park brochure — checked Sep 5, 2026
  3. Triton Cove State Park — checked Sep 5, 2026
The flyer: STOP BLOOD CANCER set in tall letters over a dark plum page, a quote, and a QR code beside a text-to-join line for the U.S.One standing face of the table tent: the same headline and quote on the left, a large QR code on the right.

Take it off the screen

Print it. Put it where people already stand.

A coffee counter, a church foyer, a break room, a race table. Every sheet carries the code that opens Jeana’s walk, and a number to text for anyone who would rather not scan — no app, no wifi, nothing to hand back.Every sheet carries the code that opens Jeana’s walk — nothing to install, nothing to hand back. The number to text printed beside it is for joining NMDP, which registers people who live in the U.S., its territories and the freely associated states. If you live anywhere else, find your country’s registry.

Everything else for running a drive

Rather be the one at the table?

Host a registration drive at your school, work or place of worship, raise funds, or lend a skill. Tell us what you have in mind and we will help you plan it.

Ways to volunteerHost a registration drive