Hurricane Ridge is a subalpine meadow walk with marmots in the grass and Olympic peaks in front of you. On a clear day the Strait of Juan de Fuca fills in behind them. Wildflowers take the meadow once the snow is gone. You drive up from Port Angeles, and as of September 2026 the ridge has restrooms in temporary trailers and no drinking water or food after the 2023 day-lodge fire, so you fill bottles before you go.
Heart O' the Hills is the first night, just inside the entrance, the pad that still works when the others are full. Fairholme is the Lake Crescent overnight after you come down from the ridge. Sol Duc Hot Springs is farther along that north side, and the Hoh rain forest campground is the west-side night, with Forks the nearest town.
Fairholme, Sol Duc, and the Hoh take summer reservations, so you lock the site before you lock the van. Most of those pads take a van to 21 feet, with a few to 35, and Sol Duc's hookup row holds 26 to 36. If you need the extra length, a larger Seattle RV matches those pads better.
Snoqualmie Pass and the Alpine Lakes
Denny Creek Campground is the forest overnight on the pass, open and within walking distance of Franklin Falls Trail and the Denny Creek Trail into the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. The falls are a short streamside walk along the South Fork Snoqualmie. The Forest Service calls that trailhead "one of the most popular on the I-90 corridor".
The trailhead is a day-use fee site. A Northwest Forest Pass, an Interagency pass, or a QR-code day pass works, and a Washington Discover Pass does not. In winter the Franklin Falls Sno-Park does not operate, Denny Creek Road stays unplowed and closed to motorized traffic, and the ski day moves to The Summit at Snoqualmie on WA-906.
Mount Rainier is the other big mountain south of Seattle, and that overnight belongs to Tacoma.
The Bainbridge and Edmonds ferries
The way onto the peninsula from Seattle is the boat to Bainbridge Island or the Edmonds run to Kingston. As of September 2026, Washington State Ferries does not take vehicle reservations on either route, so a van just queues. Fares are tiered by vehicle length, and you can skip the boat and reach the peninsula on US-101 instead.
Seattle itself is a parked day if you want the city, and you sleep outside it. The San Juan Islands are a different ferry trip, leaving from Anacortes, and that run starts in Mount Vernon.
South of Seattle, Portland is the overnight city that direction. Vancouver is across the border.
