What's So Great About Forks...

... I really don't know. Don't get me wrong, it's a great little town filled with (from a swift outsider observation) nice,friendly welcoming people. But what begs the question is why would the now famous author of a certain series of young adult vampire books, that I won't name because of the inevitable throng of teenie-bopper series fanatics,or possibly worse the adult version (myself included, more fan than fanatic!) that would flood the site, why would she base the book in Forks? The movie appears as though it's filmed within the more densely wooded, mountainous region of the Olympic National Park and much of the plot of all the books leads your imagination to a similar destination. Not to Forks, though the small town element certainly is accurate. Anyway, one might wonder how I ended up visiting Forks, and this is where the fanatic meets the fan, I was taking a road trip with the goal of circling the Olympic National Park and realized rather exuberantly at the time as I recall that Forks was along the route. Not just any little 'ol Forks, but The Forks, of teenage vampire lore. It was impossible to resist a visit having read the whole series myself and recently turned my own mother (who looks 30 and is actually, well...let's say 36, you're welcome mom!) onto the love-sick,action packed, imagination blowing plots that go for days (literally, it's four books and they each resemble the great classics in size). Thus, I found myself eagerly anticipating this small detour on the trip. It was rather unremarkable, except for two things: First, the sign posted by a local hotel that said "Edward Cullen Did Not Sleep Here" that made one ponder at how the poor little town was affected (aside from the welcome financial benefits I'm sure) when the craze hit full speed upon release of the movie, and that every store in town (and there aren't many, most are hardware, feed and related agriculture related merchants) had some kind of "merchandise" related to the movie/books. Posters, mugs, t-shirts,jewelry, bumper stickers, charms, candy, key chains, dolls, even light up do-it-yourself fang kits.

No I did not buy a fang kit...they were out of the adult size...