Two weekends ago, I embarked on an epic journey to the small town of Forks, Wash. where the Twilight book series takes place.  My friends Mat, Jon and I set out one Sunday morning for our drive to the Mecca of Stephanie Meyer admirers.

Mat had Mapquested directions ahead of time, the estimated driving time was three and a half hours. We figured we could do it in three. We made a few stops along the way to grab some food and stop at a beach. When we reached the town of Aberdeen, we figured we had about half an hour left. Well, we were mistaken as we passed a mile marker sign reading “Forks: 99 miles.”

 

 

 

About an hour and a half later, we were finally there. It was pouring when we stopped in the Forks Visitor Center. Bella’s orange truck was parked outside. We were handed a map with various Twilight destinations to visit. Tourism has increased 1,000 percent since the first book was published in 2005. We signed the guest book and the ladies working at the center informed us that they had 200 visitors the day before. In the summer, they have around 1,000 visitors a day. To put that in perspective, in 2007 the population of Forks was 3, 221. We started seeing the sights.

Our first stop was Forks High School. There were two other cars adorned with Twilight bumper stickers posing in front of the school’s sign.

 

 

 

Next, we travelled to the bed and breakfast that is designated as the Cullen’s house. Outside, there’s a whiteboard where “Esme” updates what the Cullen’s are doing that day.

 

 

 

We were on to the “main street.” There is a grocery store and a bunch of little boutiques. No movie theater. Not really any “mainstream” stores. We stopped by the store “Dazzled by Twilight,” a store completely dedicated to the books and movies. It was kind of crazy. They had scents for each of the characters, signs, cutouts of characters, jewelry, clothing, and every other Twilight souvenier you can imagine.

After that, we went on to the Forks Hospital where there is a parking spot reserved for Dr. Cullen. And it’s right in front of the emergency room entrance which probably isn’t the greatest place for it because there were a ton of cars crowded around taking pictures. And… we joined in.

 

We went on to the house designated as Bella’s house. We were in a caravan of other Twilight fans. These people must get pretty sick of seeing a ton of people outside of their house everyday! The little girl that lived there was doing some serious people watching, creeping from the window.

Then we decided to venture out to La Push, home of the Quilete Tribe. Upon entering, there’s a sign reading “No vampires beyond this point.” We went out to the beach, and it was gorgeous but extremely windy, raining and freezing.

We called it a day and started our trek back to Seattle. It was quite the day. We spent about a two hours there and close to eight in the car.

I am Twilight fan. I’ve read all of the books. But I’m kind of embarassed to say that I’ve actually been to Forks. I mean, it was a fun adventure but I found the whole thing kind of weird. It’s this tiny little city that has had a huge economic boost from the Twilight series. And that’s awesome for them. But they get visitors from everywhere! They said their biggest group of visitors are from England! I personally can’t imagine flying out from Europe to go see Forks.

Anyway, I can now say I’ve seen all of the sights of the Twilight books. For anyone thinking of making the drive out to the Olympic Peninsula, anticipate a lot of rain and a longer drive than you planned for.