My souvenir is a pair of forks from the pizza joint

It might have looked like a pilgrimage, but really, it was just a road trip. Besides, I'm only about 150 pages into the second book.

After months of resisting, I finally bowed to girlfriend peer pressure and started reading the “Twilight” books. It's a romance series of sorts written for swoony teenage girls about drop-dead gorgeous vampires. I'm really not much of a romance reader, and I'm definitely not a vampire fan, so it wasn't until I was desperate for another distraction that I finally relented. My hair stylist is going to be thrilled at my next appointment to discover we can FINALLY chat about Edward vs. Jacob.

The books are set in the real-life town of Forks, Washington, up in the northwest thumb of my moist home state. I was looking at a map one night, locating it exactly, when I said to Rob, “Look – Highway 101 loops all around the Olympic Peninsula. That would be a fun road trip sometime.” And faster than you can say “early retirement” we had planned our route, made hotel and ferry reservations, and were trekking northward.

Our first stop was Port Angeles, right along a strait of water that separates us from the folks who say “eh” and have really cheap prescription drugs. It was a sleepy little town that looks to be dying a slow death while at the same time is pinning all its hopes on being part of what we quickly came to realize is an internationally popular “Twilight Tour.” Various scenes in the books take place here, it being the largest town near Forks nearly 2 hours away. That being said, it certainly wasn't overrun by tourists.

We walked around easily and didn't have to stand in line to take pictures of restaurants or bookstores or a movie theater that are mentioned in the series. The requisite “Dazzled by Twilight” gift store was well-stocked and seemed to have a pretty steady stream of estrogen with the occasional shot of reluctant testosterone uncomfortably hanging out in the corner. But it was nothing like the Forks' store of the two-location chain.

We ducked into the Italian restaurant where the two main characters have their first date. It smelled delicious. There was not a crowd to be found in the entire town...except here. “It will be about an hour and fifteen minutes for a table,” the young woman apologized, sizing me up as a likely Twilighter. My hunger outweighing my fandom, we bailed and ate at a tasty Mexican place down the street.

We took a break from trying to match reality with fantasy to check out the stunning Olympic Mountains and take a day trip over to Victoria, British Columbia. We elected not to pay the $100 to allow our car to join us, so we spent a lovely, sunny day wandering around the provincial capitol, the harbour, and the Parliament building, promising ourselves we will return for a dedicated vacation sometime in the near future.

The next day we awoke to unexpected sunshine and headed southwest towards Forks. The scenery was gorgeous, with moss-strewn trees and glacial lakes and green, green, green. At one stop, I could actually smell the green. It was succulent - like freshly snapped aloe vera - mixed with the slightly woody, fibrous scent of grape stems. I almost got dizzy from breathing so deeply.

The relaxing, meandering, quiet wander across the Olympic Peninsula came to an abrupt stop as we entered the town of Forks. Population 3,175, not counting the daily 10% increase of dazzled tourists.

The town is basically one main street – the highway – dotted with non-chain services. Aside from a couple of gas stations, I didn't recognize a single major chain. No big grocery stores, no fast food, no hotels with priority clubs, no big boxes of any sort. It had one stop light at which you could watch the trying-to-go-about-their-business logging locals intermingle with the barely-containing-their-excitement adolescent tourists. We parked and wandered around a bit.

The main Twilight gift store was dizzying (there were at least 3 stores proudly hocking Twilight gear). It was crowded and over-heated and under-stocked. I thought about buying a gift for a friend so I asked about a displayed t-shirt. It was among the many that were on back-order. We then walked over to a pharmacy and again were greeted with crowds swarming hungrily around the Forks t-shirts and souvenirs. For a mere $22 I could buy a shirt whose silk screen already seemed to be wearing off. Another $8 could get me a fork with a little “Forks, WA” tag attached. I declined both.

We drove over to the high school – another key location in the books – and waited patiently while a car of teenage girls and a mom took pictures of the sign. Although we didn't see that exact group again, we saw that configuration of Adolescent Girls and Coolest Mom Ever over and over.

After Rob took my picture, we stepped out of the way and chatted with an old man who revealed he worked at the Visitors Center on the other side of town. Seemed he occasionally hung out at various places to take pictures for people and answer questions. He was amazed to have met people from all over the world in the past year. “Look at a map and find the tiniest island south of Hawaii. Yup, they've been here, too.” A typical weekend gets about 1000 signatures in the Visitor Center guest book. “That's only the ones who sign!” He seemed excited and proud that his small town has become an international destination. I asked him how the locals felt about all the attention. “Well, it's great for the merchants, that's for sure. But some people wish all of them [Twilighters] would go away,” he revealed with a sweep of his hand.

While that was certainly understandable, the man's comment was the one and only hint we got that all the visitors were nothing short of totally embraced by the locals. All four of Forks' main restaurants featured Twilight-themed entrees (the Bella Burger, EdBread). Maps of the town with key spots noted were handed out for free. Souvenirs were everywhere and we spotted several small buses leading tours. We didn't stop by but supposedly the Chief of Police happily pretends his name is Charlie Swan and does his best to answer questions about his fictional daughter, Bella. According to one local: “We really try to make them feel welcome. We treat fictional characters as real people. We've had a lot of parents say, 'Thanks for making it fun for her.'”

After grabbing some pizza and snapping a few more photos, I was ready to leave the feeding frenzy of Forks and head to our final Olympic Peninsula destination: the Hoh Rain Forest. Rob had been once before and loved it, all drippy and cold and eerie and so green that he couldn't figure out which way to orient his pictures when he got them back. Given our travel history -- what with a flood in Kauai, a 3-day power outage on the Oregon coast, a bout with Norwalk on a cruise – any guesses what we found in the rain forest?? Yep, that's right. Not a drop of rain. Dry as a bone. Sunshine and shadows. I could have been wearing shorts. No need for the extra pair of dry shoes. We're thinking we'll head back in either November or January. Just our luck, it will be closed due to flooding when we finally get there.

We're just about ready to leave Astoria, Oregon to head home to Woodhaven. But not before we see if we can find the school from “Kindergarten Cop” so I can snap a picture.