Itinerary

Where I Went

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mt. rainier (2) mt. st. helens (1) weather (1)


Mount Rainier


This post was published on Wednesday 14 August 2013.

After the impressive and brooding Mount St. Helens, we were all a little concerned that Mount Rainier wouldn’t live up to it.  Oh my goodness, how wrong we all were.  It was the most beautiful day; the sky was an incredible deep blue, the sun was lovely and warm, and there were almost no clouds in the sky.  The National Park Volunteer I met at the top of Second Burroughs Mountain told me I couldn’t have picked a better day to hike up there.

After making the most of entering a National Park with other people (i.e. playing in the road!) we took the long drive round the East and South of the Park to Paradise, one of the visitor centres and trailheads.  The plan was, the three of us would go for a short walk, admire the views, and then drive back up to Sunrise, on the North side, where Abbie would paint, Jen would read, and I would hike.

The point of the short hike was for me to assess the state of my legs and knees after the sixteen-miler the day before.  They were pretty stiff and still hurting when I woke up, so I didn’t want to embark on another long hike without being reasonably confident of being physically able to return..!

Along the way to Paradise we passed Reflection Lakes.. and from the driver’s seat I spotted a remarkable thing, given the name of the lakes.. there was an amazing reflection of the mountain in the still waters.  How they come up with those names, I don’t know.

We pulled over, and this is the result:

Reflection Lakes
(One of the) Reflection Lakes
Nisqually Glacier
Nisqually Glacier

From Paradise, we did a short one-and-a-half mile walk called the Nisqually Vista Trail, which takes you up to view the Nisqually Glacier, which is one of the smaller ones, but there is a magnificent cascade of melting snow and and ice hurling itself down the mountainside.

At the viewpoint where I took the picture to the right, there was a Native American man standing facing the glacier, playing a wooden flute of some kind.  It was really quite peaceful, broken only by the beeping and clicking of cameras (sorry).  It was a beautiful view.

I mean, just look at the blue of that sky!!  Not all the pictures show it (when it is so bright, I struggled a bit with getting the exposure right to show off that wonderful azure.  Often during the day, I simply stopped to marvel at the beauty of the different colours.  The mix of green from the trees, the greys, whites and browns of the mountain picks, and the deep, deep blue of the sky, was breathtaking.

On the walk back from the vista, we found a rather odd and enormous stone, with a hole in.  Immediately she saw it, Abbie climbed in.. and so Jen and I just had to get our cameras out..

Abbie in a Hole
Abbie in a Rock

Just before Reflection Lakes, we had passed Louise Lake, so of course I insisted we had to stop off on our way back to Sunrise, so we could walk down and see my mother’s own lake.  It was lovely and peaceful, and it even had a sandy beach!  I could picture her sitting on a beach chair, reading a book (of course) while the rest of us played in the crystal-clear water.

Ensuring I skim the stone, not the camera..
Ensuring I skim the stone, not the camera..

Having other people around means I was in a couple more photos than normal (this is one of Jen’s)!  We had fun trying to skim the non-flat stones by the lakeside, with some success.  With some decent round, flat stones, I reckon we could have got close to the other side of the lake, but it wasn’t to be.

And so the road-trip continued, round to Sunrise, which is to the North of Mount Rainier.  (As an aside, I keep forgetting how long it takes to drive through a National Park.  Most of them are really quite large, and the speed limit is usually 45 on the straights—but if it’s like Rainier, there are a lot of switchbacks up and down the mountainside, so it takes a lot longer than you think to get around.  It took us about an hour-and-a-half to get from Paradise to Sunrise, which is just under fifty miles.)

By the time we got to Sunrise, it was nearly 2pm, so the parking lot was full, except for one space, which I was able to grab.  I’m not sure what we would have done if I hadn’t found a space!

After a lunch of pie and disgusting coffee from the snack bar, during which we were joined by a chipmunk eating food very naughtily left on the ground by a previous group, we headed our separate ways: Abbie and Jen to the mountainside to paint and read, and me to hike as far up the mountain as I could get!

Chipmunk!
Chipmunk!

The ranger in the visitor centre suggested a great walk: just under seven miles, with a gain of only 1000 feet, but spectacular views all round.  It was even a loop, so I didn’t have to walk back the walk I came!  The ratio of ease to spectacular was probably the highest of the entire trip.

I have so many pictures, I have been sitting here for ages trying to work out which ones to include, without including them all!  Feast your eyes on the beauty of Mount Rainier, and my hike up to the First and Second Burroughs Mountains.

On top of Second Burroughs, I met a couple who kindly took my picture.  The gentleman was an academic, who had visited not just Oxford but Cambridge too, as well as London, Nottingham and Durham.  He had even worked as a musician for a Church of England church!  It was good to have a long chat, if only to let my legs recover from the 1000-foot climb up First and Second Burroughs.

Thankfully, the walk down was lovely and gradual, giving me plenty of time to admire the different views, of the other mountains in the park, and the beautiful valleys and lakes down below.  I had a lot of fun playing with my shadow at one point, as the setting sun was poking its light over the mountain ridge behind me..

The walk was a perfect length.  I’m not sure I could have gone much further or higher than six-and-a-half miles or 1000 feet.  And it was one of the most beautiful walks I have ever done.  It could have been spoiled by the flies, but I have learned from my Grand Teton experience, and this time I had bug repellent in my bag.

I found Abbie and Jen still on the mountainside, and agreed with the man getting into his car next to ours, that one of the best parts of hiking, is taking your boots off afterwards.  All I needed was to be transported to Flathead Lake, so I could go for a quick swim to cool off!

And so, we headed home, all three of us satisfied with our labours, having enjoyed a day of perfect views and weather.

The hike up to view Mount Rainier joins the Grand Canyon sunrise and Odessa Lake in the Rocky Mountain National Park in my top three favourite parts of the trip.  It was such a beautiful day, and the hike up had an almost unbroken view of Rainier.  I mean, how could it not—it towers 7000 feet above even Second Burroughs!  It simply dominates the skyline for miles around, and rightly so.

If you ever visit Washington State, do not leave until you have visited Mount Rainier.  You will not be disappointed.