Ruby Beach, Olympic National Park

Complementing last week's post about Ozette village, lets stay out on the coast for a bit.  Back in June the Forks Forum published a historic photo of Ruby Beach that dates, I think, to the 1930's.  Here it is:

Photograph of Ruby Beach, probably from the 1930's.  Unknown source, but published by the Forks Forum on their Facebook page on June 18.  

This photo really blew me away, as I had no idea that this site, which is now a very popular hike-in day use area along Olympic National Park's coastal strip, was used in this way.  The site is striking, in part because of the very prominent sea stacks and promontories visible in the background of this photo...which also make the modern perspective very easy to recreate.  A few weeks ago I did just that after a visit to Kalaloch to do some field data collection.  Here is the modern view:

Photograph of Ruby Beach, 26 June 2020.

If you look closely at these two photos you can also note some very minor, but obvious, landscape changes along the bank of Cedar Creek in the near field, and to the sea stacks in the far field.   Rocky stacks along Washington's coast seem permanent, but are continually changing and eroding...a process that we typically can't "see" unless we have the chance to view the changes over long time-spans, like the roughly 80-90 intervening years between these two photos.