October 4, 2015 Mt Rainier National Park, Washington

Another sunny and high 60’s day. No wind today.

First light on the smoke in the trees. We went up to Paradise to hike the Nisqually view trail. It is closed during the week-they are paving it! Here are dead branches and red foliage.

 

John taking a photo of his feet with the glaciers. . . This time of year the glaciers are real dirty, as cool as it is to see them, they look better from a distance. I guess in a normal year the mountain looks more like a snow ball than a rock like it does this year in the drought. This area is the most popular part  in the park, there are hordes of people –most who don’t speak English hiking, most of the trails are paved. In the summer these meadows are fields of wild flowers. Pretty stuff to see and it is nice to see people enjoying the National parks, but not exactly a wilderness experience.

A waterfall in the glaciers. All of the dirty stuff around it is glacier. At lunch this ballsy fat  chipmunk got right on John’s pack trying to steal food. John poured water on it to make it go away, and it didn’t faze it.

John on one of the non main trails coming down from the glacier views. Our next stop was Box Canyon. This is the Muddy Fork of the Cowlitz river. The water is 180 feet below us on the bridge. The canyon is about 15 feet wide. John looked it up, people boat this, it is a class V. Way above my skill level, but very pretty.

 

Closer ups of the Box Canyon from another bridge on the trail up the canyon.  I am standing on a rock polished by glacial ice. Stevens Canyon which this runs into was all carved by a glacier. Very deep canyon, but wider than this.

 

The Grove of the Patriarchs trail is through a small area of old growth forest where the trees are 1000 years old and up to 200 feet high. They were 500 years old when Columbus discovered the new world. The whole pacific northwest was covered with them before the loggers came. John is lifting a log from across the trail so I can get by. There is this cool very mobile suspension bridge over the Ohanapecosh river. You kind of bounce your way across it. Really unnerving if someone else is walking too.

The trees are huge. Very majestic. Lovely trail. John is in the photos so you can tell how big these really are. This big one sucked him in.

  

Very tall tree.  A dragon fly, the roots of a huge tree that fell over-the roots about 20 feet wide-and hollow inside, mushrooms that look like cinnamon was sprinkled over them, red vine maple leaves, a burl on a downed tree and a monument to the 10th mountain division. They trained at Paradise on Mt Rainier and at Camp Hall in Colorado in skiing and mountaineering  during the winter of 1941-42. They skied into Italy and took Riva Ridge helping the end of world war II in 1945.

The Wonderland Trail goes all the way around Mt Rainier. 93 miles long. Bet that would be a fantastic backpack.

October 3, 2015 Rainier National Park, Washington

Another day at Rainier. It rained all night, it was cloudy and misty and in the 60’s when we headed out.

 

The gate into Rainier today and  in the early   1900’s. Cars went into Rainier in 1907, but it wasn’t until 1914 that they allowed women to drive cars into the park. We drove into a cloud, fog so thick that you could barely see the road. It was really scarier when you could not see over the cliffs than when you could see what was down there.

 

As we went higher up the mountain the fogged started to dissipate.  We were above the fog around 5,000 feet.

You could still see it down in the valleys. The wind was blowing it down canyon, you could see it boiling up.

I guess the tourist’s can’t read the don’t feed the animals signs. A small waterfall in the sunlight on Paradise creek.

 

We had wanted to hike in the old growth forests, so we went back down to the fog. The trees in the fog were cool gives them an aura. We hiked to Upper Christine Falls.

When the park service took over and cars began to come into the park they built this gas station. There was also a fancy Inn, but it burned down. The auxiliary building with   extra  rooms is now the Inn, but it does not have the fancy lobby most National parks have.  Here is a cross section of a 700  year old tree. It has  events and dates marked on it.

 

In the restroom in the Longmire area I saw these basics of toilet use in the bathroom. I love the Men-stand close, it is shorter then you think!!  John took this shot of me in front of the Longmire National Park Inn.

We hiked the Trail of the Shadows, it goes around the meadow  with a  hot spring.  The  Longmire family had a lodge  that was  a medicinal hot spring resort. It is in old growth forest. The ground is carpeted with moss here. John is standing near one of the old soaking tubs. Below is Rusty fountain. There is a lot of iron in water.

 

Then we hiked the Two Firs trail, it is also old growth. John hugged this old guy and got sap all over himself. John is standing behind one of the giant downfalls. You can only see his head,the log is so big.

 

He had to lay way back by this giant to even see the top.  Here I am with a big one. I love these old growth forests.

    

Mushrooms, a moss lined creek, vanilla leaves, fungus on a stump and a banana slug inside a rotting tree. We stopped at Copper Creek Lodge for snacks and a drink on the way back. This lodge was built in 1917 and has a long interesting history. It is now a restaurant, lodge and cabins with hot tubs.

October 1, 2015 Mt Rainier, Washington

We are camped at a free horse campground right outside the park. We had to buy a Washington parks pass for $35, but we can stay here for no charge each night. Plus we already used the park pass yesterday at Seaquest.  We looked at the campground in the park, it would have been a tight fit for the coach, and it is at 3000+ feet and supposed to be really cold up there (only around 1000 feet at the horse camp), and it was $10 a night. Neither place has hookups, but at the horse park we are parked in the sun and can try out our new solar.

Mt Rainier on the way in. It is a lovely, huge mountain. Today is sunny and 61 at Paradise lodge, 70’s where we are camped. It is supposed to rain the next couple days, so we wanted to see the views before it clouded in. This is the old administration building at Longmire area. It is built in the ‘rustic’ style that the national park system adopted. Rainier was the 5th National park in 1899.

The lower Christine falls under a CCC stone bridge. We are going to hike the upper soon.  John and I at a scenic turn out.

 

Narada falls were beautiful in the sunlight with a rainbow. Paradise is where the main visitors center, guide services lodge  and Inn are. It is at tree line.

 

A model of Rainier in the visitors center. It is 14,000 feet and much, much higher than the surrounding area. This John Muir quote ‘…the most luxuriant and most extravagantly beautiful of all the alpine gardens I ever beheld in all my mountain-top wanderings’ is on the steps leading to many trails in the area. In the summer this whole area is a huge field of flowers. Sorry we missed it. 

No fields of flowers but the shrubbery is in it’s fall colors. Myrna falls.

Paradise Inn opened in 1917. John at the head of the table in Paradise lodge.

Me at the other head. The inside of the lodge has these big timbers and huge fireplaces.

Evening light down canyon from Paradise. A reflection of Mt Rainier in Reflection lake.

  

Sunset colors on surrounding mountains. Fall colors and a stellar jay watching us as we had a beverage on the deck of Paradise lodge in the last light.