Originally Posted by
Gardyloo
I wouldn't worry at all about the ferries filling up; this is seldom the case westbound on weekdays.
Are you planning to travel from Lake Quinault to PDX, including touring the Gorge, all on one day? I don't think that's very practical. If you have two days to accomplish this, then I'd try to follow this route if possible. It includes Cape Disappointment at the (awesome) mouth of the Columbia, then follows the north shore of the river eastbound. The drive along the north shore is considerably more pleasant than the alternate routes through Oregon, or back to I-5 via US 12.
https://goo.gl/maps/LaogFR9Yu5y4mVs57
Thanks so much for the route suggestion -- we're spending a night at McMenamins Olympic Club in Centralia between Quinault and PDX. We were originally planning to fly into SeaTac and drive directly there on our way to ONP (doing the reverse of our existing plans: Centralia to Quinault to Crescent and skipping Seattle altogether), but we've changed our itinerary a number of times for various reasons and ended up switching this to the back end of the trip and taking the ferry through Bainbridge instead.