Mt. Rainier West- Part 2 (9/15/24)

 Day 5

After hiking quite a few days in a row, we decided we needed to take a day off from it, so we looked for a scenic drive outside the park. There isn’t much, but we drove into the national forest anyway. It was pretty dense brush, with not much to see.

Every once in a while a view would open up, and we were able to see Mount St. Helens in the distance.

Cell phone cameras being what they are these days, I usually can’t justify carrying my small Panasonic camera around with me. Most times, I don’t even take my big camera either. The biggest difference in the pictures is if I want to zoom in on a subject. Playing around one day, I took some close ups of Mount Rainier. I would not have gotten these pictures with my phone.

I actually zoomed in on some “dots” on a glacier that turned out to be people hiking, but I deleted the picture by accident.

                                             Day 6

 

Part of the reason the parking lots at Paradise are always crowded is that many hiking trails start from there, so people don’t just come for an hour and then leave. Of course, one of the trails we wanted to hike originates from there, so we sucked it up and drove up the hill at 6:45 am. We got one of the last spots in the main lot. It also happens to be Labor Day weekend now, which didn’t help.

The trail we chose was Panorama Point. The name implies there might be a good view once you get there but in reality, the views started at the trailhead and never quit.

I kept thinking “follow the yellow brick road” during this part of the trail…

We saw more wildlife on this trail than we had seen all week-in fact, in this section a black bear cub ran across the trail between Paul and I. Everyone froze, waiting to see if mom came up behind him, but he was running so fast, I think she was ahead of him and he was catching up. Very cool.

We also saw a mountain goat, a deer, and several marmots.

At “Glacier Viewpoint” there were excellent views of the nearby …glaciers- we noticed after we took the pictures that although they are in color, they look like they are in black and white. There was a pretty cool waterfall across the way.

I think this was my favorite trail in the park- although it wasn’t that easy- 5 miles and 1500 ft of gain, there was a lot of bang for the buck in the view department. Paul’s favorite trail was the one we did the following day, our last day in the park.

                                                   Day 7

The trail to Comet Falls is 5 miles round trip, with 1600 feet of gain. So, a repeat of the day before. Luckily we are in better hiking shape now, so its manageable for us.

We passed several waterfalls along the way to Comet.

Of course, many times when hiking to a waterfall, you have to go UP- and this trail was no exception.

When we got to this one, we assumed it was Comet Falls, but in fact, we still had a quarter mile to go…

We finally made it- it was worth the effort.

Mt. Rainier- West- Part 1 (9-5-24)

 After resupplying in the small town of Packwood, and doing laundry, we headed to the western section of Mt. Rainier National Park. This area is called the Paradise Corridor. 

At the entrance to the park there was someone selling cherries from a table. Clever idea, since the line to get in the park was very slow, so people had time to jump out of their cars, buy the cherries, and jump back in before they moved too far. We took advantage and bought some ourselves- they were very good- so good we stopped for more a few days later.

This side of the park also has timed entry, but our campground is inside the park this time, so our reservation is our ticket to get in.

Day 1

It didn’t take us long to set up so we went off to explore the Longmire area of the park. This national historic district has a small museum, and a hotel with a restaurant that was built in 1926.  We ate at the restaurant twice during our stay, and the weather was finally nice enough to sit outside both times.

(this is me, taking a totally crappy,  fast picture with my phone).

The area was first developed by James Longmire in about 1886 when he discovered the nearby hot springs, and bought the land. He set it up as a tourist destination, raised his family here, and after his death the land was sold to the national park. The best part about this area is that they have Wi-fi, and its only two miles from our campsite.

From there, we drove 13 miles in the other direction, to the Paradise corridor, stopping at some viewpoints along the way. The most impressive was Christine Falls. It’s right near the road, so, easy to visit.

At this point, we have yet to actually see Mount Rainier, although the ranger assured us the weather should be clear enough tomorrow to see it.

The first thing we noticed up at Paradise is that this is the BUSY part of the park.

Even though there is tons of parking, the closest spot we could have parked was over half a mile from the visitor center. We didn’t need to see anything that badly so we left it for another day. We did take advantage of the cell service to do whatever we needed.

Day 2

With a zoom meeting scheduled for 1 pm, we elected to hike a short-ish trail in the morning. In fact, the trail to Carter Falls is accessible from our campsite so we didn’t have to drive anywhere. Once we were in the open, we got our first clear view of Mt. Rainier!

This is when we could see the steam escaping at the top.

The trail starts by crossing the Nisqually River.

It continues through the woods to the falls. Paul was really impressed with the old wooden water pipe, wrapped in metal. It has to be over a hundred years old. I enjoy these types of trails- the only sound is the water running in the river, and there are no bugs.

The falls themselves weren’t very impressive, and it was hard to get a good picture of them . We continued a little further and turned around when we got to Madcap Falls.

Done with the hike, we headed up to the Paradise area again. All we needed was cell signal, so once we had it, we parked. We thought we would grab lunch at the inn up here, but the place was so crowded we skipped it.

Day 3

Today was a bit of a “push” hike for us. We hiked 5.5 miles r/t up the Rampart Ridge, with a total of 1300 ft of gain. The stone columns are called ramparts. 

The views weren’t really worth all the effort, but we got a good workout. The name of the ridge sparked a hilarious conversation between us about the words to the national anthem. We both drew a blank on some of the lines (mostly the one with “rampart” in it- but luckily we had cell signal at the top of the ridge, so I “googled” it).

After eating lunch at the camper, we had to go into town to get propane. We have a leak in a hose, so we are going through it pretty fast. It was a long drive but we had no choice (we took advantage and got more cherries).

Day 4

Sometimes we don’t realize how much we depend on our cellphones/electronics to stay connected. Right now we are hyper aware- we had to find someplace that actually sells propane, and we were trying to make plans to spend the day with our friends Liz and Randy, who happen to be in the area. Anything we need cell signal or internet for, requires us to drive somewhere. Liz and Randy were trying to get timed entry into the park but we wouldn’t know if they did or didn’t. We gave them our campsite information and said we would just wait there until they showed up.

Once they did, we were off and running. We stopped by to get another look at Christine Falls, and stopped at several of the viewpoints as we drove deeper into the park. Our goal was to hike from Reflection Lake to Narada Falls.

 
We actually didn’t have to hike to the falls, its right on the road, but we wanted to hike. The weather was absolutely perfect, with bright blue skies as a background for the mountain. Later in the day a few low hanging clouds started to develop.

The trail wasn’t very crowded, but that’s not to say we were all by ourselves…

We hung around Narada Falls for a bit- long enough to get a selfie, of course.

Along the 3.5 mile trail there was plenty to see-

We also got our first glimpse of Mount Adams in the distance.

Done with exploring, it was back to the camper for dinner…and margaritas. And then it was time to say goodbye, for now.

Mount Rainier National Park- East (09/02/24)

 The facts and figures: In 1899 Mount Rainier became our 5th national park. It stands at 14,400 feet and is the tallest volcano in the cascade range. Although it is in a “quiet” phase, it is still an active volcano, and steam sometimes escapes from the inner core- we actually got to see that one day. It is the most glaciated peak in the “lower 48” with 25 glaciers. It was the first national park to allow personal vehicles- and to collect an entrance fee.

With the eastern most section of the park- the Ohanapecosh area being added in 1931, it’s no surprise that the CCC ( Civilian Conservation Corp) had much to do with the construction of roads, trails and buildings. Some of them still stand today.

This section of the park is less busy than the western side, and it’s called the Sunrise corridor. The campground is not technically inside the park and the park runs on a timed entry system, meaning that you have to book a two hour window to drive into the park- or be at the gate before 7 am. At least that would be doable since the gate is about a half hour from us but the ranger said just come to the office at 7 pm the night before we want to go in the park, which is when “ the rest” of the tickets are issued. Some tickets are issued months in advance, and some are issued the night before.  So, at 7 pm a bunch of people show up at the office, us included, to use the Wi-Fi. There is no cell signal in the campground and the tickets have to be booked online. We had no issue getting them, so that was nice.

                                                                So, Day 1

Looking at the weather forecast, we knew Day One would be our best day for any hikes that might have a view, so we headed up to the Sunrise visitor center. On the way there we were rewarded with our first good views of some of the glaciers.

After checking out the exhibits, we started out on our hike- part of the Wonderland trail and part of the Sourdough Ridge trail, to form a 5 mile loop.  The Wonderland trail is 93 miles long and encircles Mt. Rainier, so many of the trails intersect with it.

The first section of trail had an offshoot to a viewpoint. Knowing we had a long hike, I debated whether we should do it ( more elevation gain) but I am really glad we did. The view from here was one of the best all day.

From there we passed by two lakes, but with the dreary weather, there was nothing exciting about them. 

The climb to Sourdough Ridge was where the tough elevation gain came into play, and once we made it to the ridge, it was freezing- but not freezing enough to keep Frozen Lake frozen. Didn’t even take a picture.

At this point, the fog and clouds were constantly moving and changing what we could see and not see.

Heading down the ridge we had our first, and soon after, our second great wildlife sighting of the day ( we saw an elk on the spur trail, but from very far away).

A hoary marmot came wandering across the rubble next to the trail, and the next thing I knew he was on the trail directly behind me.

As we looked off into the distance to admire the view of the North Cascade mountains, we spied a mountain goat.

He was just chilling out, relaxing for the afternoon.

We loved the hike and the views, although we didn’t know what we were actually missing until a few days later.

                                                                   Day 2

What’s worse than hiking a trail when its drizzling, and 55 degrees outside? Sitting in a camper, with no electricity and no cell service, when it’s drizzling, and 55 degrees outside ( This is the inside of the camper at 11 am). A note- yes we can use our lights- we have a great battery, and gobs of solar panels,  but we are in a no-generator use loop, and it’s been raining on an off for days.

This is why we hiked our second day. Plus the forecast for the following day was even worse.

We chose a trail nearby, the highly rated Silver Falls trail. We could have walked there from the campground but it would have added some mileage…in the rain. Nope.

The falls were spectacular- hard to get a picture that does them justice.

Once we had our fill, we continued on, deep into the forest along the river, which gave us some protection from the rain.

This trail meets up with the iconic Grove of the Patriarchs, which is a grove of old growth trees, but the trail is closed due to a bridge being damaged. We still thoroughly enjoyed the walk and had a good time using our “Seek” app to identify the trees we were seeing. 

All in all, we hiked about 3 miles, not bad for a rainy day.

As I said, the forecast for the following day was even worse, and we were out of ideas for hikes in the rain, so we elected to leave the park a day early and stay in town where we could do some laundry, charge our battery, have cell service,  and pick up some supplies. Our stay on the west side of the park is a full week- without services of any kind.