PNW Road Trip - Day 6 - Another Beautiful Day in Mount Rainier NP

Once again, day six of our PNW road trip started off a little lazily with some coffee and some breakfast in our room (however, today it was my turn to go for coffee...not sure I liked that as much) at Paradise Lodge in Mount Rainier National Park. After breakfast was finished, we packed up our gear for the day and headed the only other direction (southwest) we could go (since the road to Sunrise was closed), toward Longmire and the Wonderland Trail. After a bit of a rough start in the parking lot, I headed over to the National Park Ranger Station in Longmire to talk about what trails we wanted to hike. We decided on the Trail of the Shadows, which is an old growth forest (and part of the Wonderland Trail), and Kautz Creek Trail. Below is a photo of the Longmire Ranger Station. It seemed like a ghost town here since they were just starting to gear up for the season.

 Another Stellar Jay that we ran across in the parking lot.

 I had heard lots about the Wonderland Trail...it goes for 93 miles and encircles Mount Rainier. We weren't planning on all that..just a few miles for us!

Longmire Meadow

 Longmire Cabin with me peeking out :)

The colors were beautiful.

More Longmire Meadow

Looking up!

Came around a corner and saw a pretty doe munching on some of the skunk lilies....she had a couple of friends with her too.

There were fields and fields of skunk lilies.

 After finishing the Trail of the Shadows and Longmire Meadows hikes, we headed to Kautz Creek. Below is a stone sculture along the Kautz Creek Trail. I am always fascinated with these, ever since going to Big Sur in the 80's and finding a bunch of them in the Big Sur River.

Milkweed!

Kautz Creek was a pretty trail that we hiked until we reached the snow line.

After the Kautz Creek hike, the clouds were starting to part and we could partially see Mount Rainier in the distance.

After Kautz Creek, we decided to head back to Paradise to see if Mount Rainier might be showing herself. We stopped off at a couple of places on the drive back, including Christine Falls.

Christine Falls

We also stopped at a lookout point to view Nisqually Glacier.

Nisqually Glacier

By the time we got back to Paradise Lodge, the clouds had cleared.

After putting all our stuff back in the room, we headed out to "our" snowbank to take some more photos, then we headed over to the Paradise Visitor Center. We watched until even that little wisp of a cloud cleared away.

Paradise Lodge with Mount Rainier behind.

After all the photos had been taken, we settled in the lobby of the lodge with our laptops and wine to go over photos from the day. While we were hanging out in the lobby, it started to snow...lovely! Also while we were sitting there, a large chunk of snow fell off the roof, made a really loud noise, and almost buried a guest who was standing by the door. Luckily, no one was injured.

Sunset at Paradise Lodge. So still and peaceful.

Well, our final night in Mount Rainier has come to a close. It has been a wonderful stay. I can't wait to come back again...maybe one July to see the wildflowers and to make it to Sunrise. Tomorrow morning, we are off to the Olympic Peninsula!

PNW Road Trip Day 5: Mount Rainier

Day five started out lazy and relaxed with a couple of cups of coffee brought to me in the room...yeah, that's the way it should be :)! After coffee and having a little breakfast in the room, we headed over to the Paradise Visitor Center to see if we could talk to a ranger that could give us any hope of Mount Rainier coming out of the clouds during our visit. Of course, we were told that they had no idea, but that She hadn't shown herself all weekend. Okay, not a lot of hope. Next, we packed up our gear for the day and headed east over to Box Canyon and to the Grove of the Patriarchs to do a little hiking. It was a beautiful drive with the mountains of Stevens Ridge on one side and the Tatoosh Range on the other. After stopping at Inspiration Point which was covered in snow,  we came upon this cool rock tunnel (below) right before entering Stevens Ridge.

Stevens Ridge

Unicorn Peak and the Tatoosh Range

 Our next stop is arguably one of the most photographed places in all of Mount Rainier National Park, Reflection Lake, where you usually see Mount Rainier and its' reflection in the lake along with beautiful wildflowers in the foreground. Well, not today! As you can see below, Reflection Lake was still frozen over and Mount Rainier was covered in clouds. Ah well, I took a photo anyway...the soft blue ice covering the lake was pretty and the sun was shining on the snow beyond. It was a slick climb up to this viewpoint too!

 This beautiful little bird came and hung out with us for awhile on this stop. She was quite the ham.

 Our next stop was at Box Canyon of the Cowlitz. I just love the name. 

When we got to the overlook, someone was telling us to go north.

A very colorful Stellar Jay in the parking lot.

Grove of the Patriarchs Nature Trail. This was a very cool hike through a forest of old growth trees, some of which are a thousand years old, onto an island in the middle of the Ohanapecosh River. 

This is where the infamous "lens cap video incident" took place...one of the funnier moments on this trip! This is the rope bridge that takes you over the  Ohanapecosh River onto the island and the Lens Cap Video is below that.

Haha, anyway here is the video retake with the lens cap off.

After the Grove of the Patriarchs, we hiked up the road a ways to Silver Falls.

We arrived back at the hotel around 5 PM. We poured some wine and took our laptops out into the lobby to relax and look over our photos from the day. The atmosphere in the lobby was wonderful, which I find to be the case in a lot of National Park Lodges. They had the fireplaces going at both ends and there was a piano player that was playing some music. We sat at one of the window tables that had big glass windows...just in case Mount Rainier had a change of heart. A couple of hours later, we headed back to our room to drop off our cameras and laptops, then we headed to the dining room. About halfway through our meal, we noticed that the sun was peaking out of the clouds outside. There were still a lot of clouds hovering, but it started to look a bit more promising. Okay, we better get our bill just in case we have to make a run for it.

The photo below is the roof of the Paradise Lodge lobby.

Just as we were finishing up in the dining room around 8 PM, the sun made it's appearance known. We looked outside and.the clouds were lifting fast....we were beginning to see the outline of a mountain...a big mountain! We left the dining room and ran down the two corridors to our room...grabbed our cameras and flew out the backdoor of the hotel. We scrambled up a large snowbank, laughing and sinking up to our knees at times as we went. When we finally reached the top of that snowbank and turned around, well, let me just say that this was the best moment of the whole the trip for me.

Not another soul to be seen. Everyone had either left after Memorial Day weekend, or they were in for the night. It was us alone with the mountain.

And, there She was...what an incredible sight. 

Thank you Mount Rainier.

PNW Road Trip Day 4: Columbia River Gorge to Mount Rainier

We had one more very full day ahead of us before getting ourselves up to Mount Rainier for three nights. While I've been busy having fun these last three days, I was also looking forward to settling in for a few days and catching my breath. We awoke close to the crack of dawn and packed up the car, had a little breakfast out of the ice chest and we were ready to go. We were heading a little north to Astoria and then due east to the Columbia River Gorge. I'd been wanting to visit the gorge for many many years, and now the day was finally here. Yay...let's go!

About two hours later, we found ourselves entering Troutdale, as you can see, it's the Gateway to The Gorge! 

First we crossed Sandy River Bridge that leads to the Historic Columbia River Highway. I had to take a photo of it because it was a nice bridge, and besides, it had my name.

A cloudy day here at the gorge, but I wasn't complaining. Our first stop was at the Portland Women's Forum State Scenic Viewpoint (quite a mouthful), and Chanticleer Point. Pretty!

 Next stop was Vista House and Crown Point Overlook. It was already starting to get crowded at this point. I was shocked I was able to get a photo of Vista House without a bunch of people all over. We strolled around here for awhile, climbed to the balcony in Vista House and then were ready to move on. Oh, I think the waterfalls start after this stop!

Our first hike of the day was to Latourell Falls. I thought this was one of the prettier falls along the gorge. Unfortunately, on the way down from this hike..actually it was on the pavement after the hike (go figure!), I took a nice hard fall myself. I stepped sideways on a pebble or something on that path and twisted all the way around and landed HARD on my butt. Ouch! I was pretty stunned and when these nice people came up and asked me if I was okay, do you know what I said to them??? "Am I okay?, what about my camera?!" They must have thought I was insane. Anyway, whoever you nice people were, I thank you now.

Next up was a hike to Bridal Veil Falls. This hike was beautiful. Lots of  pretty streams with moss-covered rocks.

Bridal Veil Falls

The next falls was Wakeena Falls, which was also very beautiful There was a lot of spray coming off these falls, so I had to be quick with my camera! I actually ended up loving this point of view, below.

Next up was the most famous falls at the gorge...Multnomah Falls. I'd heard a lot about these falls and they definitely lived up to their name. My only other comment....crowded! Think almost Disneyland-like in some parts, only in a natural setting. I would like to come back here on another day....not the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend! In any case, they were stunning and we did make it up to the bridge in the photos below. We chose not to hike all the way to the top since we were on a pretty tight time schedule. Next time!

 

Our last stop was at Horsetail Falls. I think it was about 4 PM by this point. I would have loved to have gone further, but we had to double-back to Portland and head up to Mount Rainier before it got dark, and we had no idea what to expect weather-wise once we got up there.

A few hours later, around 7 PM, we found ourselves pulling into Mount Rainier National Park. I was very excited about Mount Rainier. I have come to realize that I have a very strong attachment to the mountains. I love the ocean, the desert, the jungle, the rain forest, etc., but I feel most at home and happy in the mountains. This is where I belong.

About 30 minutes after entering the park, the snow picked up and the visibility became iffy. We couldn't really see what was on the sides of the road, other than snow and haze. The snow started getting pretty heavy a few minutes later and it was getting dark. We passed the Paradise Visitor Center and ended up at the road closure pictured below. For a few minutes, we were rather concerned and at a loss as to what to do. We turned around, thinking we may have to drive all the way back out of the park and find somewhere else to stay, if the road to our hotel was closed off, but then, much to our relief, there is was, Paradise Lodge, right next to the visitor center partially covered in snow! Whew!

We were very happy to find the beautiful Paradise Lodge...especially with a big fire place lit in the lobby!

After we put all our luggage in our room (that had an amazing view of Mount Rainier, although at this point, we didn't know that), we headed down to the snack bar for a little dinner. That was about it for me and this day. Time for sleep, and thankfully, we didn't need to be up at the crack of dawn tomorrow.