Sequim Gazette staff

This wet Olympic Peninsula winter got you down? Perhaps exploring the world vicariously is an antidote.
The “Adventure Travel Series,” a set of slide show presentations each Friday evening in January in Port Angeles, brings to life travels across the globe and even under water.

The series, a fundraiser to buy supplies and lunches for volunteers working on the Olympic Discovery Trail, begins Jan. 7 when Elston and Jackie Hill present a feature about Midway Atoll, one of the least-visited wildlife sanctuaries in the world (see description below).

Now in its fifth year, the series and its presenters aim to bring entertaining talks about adventurous travel in addition to raising funds for the trail volunteers.

The series is somewhat a prelude to the Peninsula Trails Coalition’s “Traveler’s Journal” series that begins in February.

Admission is $5 per person and each show is at the Port Angeles Senior Center, 328 E. Seventh St., Port Angeles.

• Jan. 7
“Midway Atoll, A Most Unusual Wildlife Preserve,” with Elston and Jackie Hill
Midway Atoll (Midway Island) is both one of the most-spectacular and least-visited wildlife sanctuaries in the world. The wildlife viewing in Midway is comparable to Antarctica and The Galapagos in that visitors get very close to the wildlife but with one very significant advantage: The number of visitors to the atoll is very small and contact with the wildlife is a 24-hour experience and extraordinarily intimate. The Hills talk about their experience on Midway, including the engine failure on their plane that resulted in their enjoying an extra two days there.  

• Jan. 14
“Building the Spruce Railroad,” with Steve Hauff
In 1918, the Spruce Production Division of the U.S. Army conducted a major operation in Clallam County to provide aircraft spruce for the war effort. The activities included construction of a sawmill and the building of 39 miles of railroad. This is the story of a part of those Herculean efforts.

• Jan. 21
“Travels in Mongolia: From the Gobi to the Taiga Forest,” with John Wegmann
John and Mary Wegmann have traveled to five different parts of Mongolia in the past eight years as members of summer field camps for undergraduate geology students from American colleges. This program presents images and stories ranging from the Gobi Desert in the south to the Altai Mountains in the west and the taiga forests in northernmost Mongolia. 

• Jan. 28
“The World Underwater,” with Hal Everett
The last slide show in the series gives a tour in the oceans of the Pacific Northwest, Caribbean, Southeast Pacific and the Southwest Pacific-Indian Ocean regions. Photographs and video clips show a variety of undersea life, including sharks. A highlight of the program is rare video of an encounter with humpback whales.