Mount Rainier National Park

Day 13: Thursday, July 11, 2019
We woke up around 6:00, got ready quickly, had a quick breakfast and Sean did his tear-down tasks to close up the RV. We pulled out of the RV park by 6:50 am. We had about a 6-hour drive for the day so Sean wanted to get an early start and get ahead of the heat. We stopped around noon for some gas and lunch then kept going on our journey.

When we crossed into the state of Washington, Sean completed his goal of visiting all 50 US states—yahoo!!!


We stopped at Walmart for groceries, then made our way to the Harmony Lakeside RV Park by 3:30 pm. The kids and I got a few things set up and then walked down to check out the lake while Sean set the RV up.





Barrett and I had an epic game of soccer! I gave him a run for his money, but he beat me by one goal, 5-4!



We cooked and ate dinner, did some research on Mt. Rainier for the next day, and got to bed at a decent hour so we could be ready to head to Mt. Rainier early in the morning. We’ve been telling Barrett that there is a wagon that goes around some of the campgrounds to pick up kids who are out too late and take them to a community room to sleep away from their parents, so he was more than willing to get to bed in the RV! (we’re mean, but it’s been effective!)



Day 14: Friday, July 12

I got up at 5:15 and headed out for an early run—Kinsey and Sean assured me they thought the road we came in on was not too hilly so I set out and quickly realized they were wrong! I ran up and down some monster hills, looped around a small neighborhood a few times, and 4 miles later made it back to the campground.


I showered and got sandwiches ready, and Sean provided wakeup entertainment with the ranger dolls saying “Just OK is not OK when it comes to protecting your national parks!” (we love that commercial and adapt any way we can!)


Then we set out for our day at Mt. Rainier National Park.

It was a bit of a drive from where we were staying, but we got to the park right at 9 am when the Longmire Museum was opening. The kids got their junior ranger books, we checked out a few exhibits, and then set out for our first destination. We drove to the overlook for Christine Falls, which was a pretty sight.



Next, we headed to Paradise, where the main visitor’s center was and go ourselves ready to hike the Skyline Trail. Even from the bottom of the trail, the mountain was in clear view and the ranger said that it was the first day in over a week that the mountain was visible through the fog.



We ended up doing the Glacier View trail and the initial climb (about first half mile) was STEEP! We made it with minimal complaining, but that was a tough one—and we were not even loaded down with gear like many of the other backpackers on the trail. We kept on the path and went through the famous meadows of wildflowers, some still with patches of snow. We caught sight of more ground squirrels and several marmots up close. We reached the glacier view lookout at about 1.25 miles and it was totally worth it. We spent about 30 minutes there, having water and snacks, and the kids worked on an activity from their books.







As we headed back down the trail, we crossed a few snowy spots, saw some marmots fighting (a ranger told is it was more playful than violent), and then Barrett decided he wanted to do some exercises, haha!








We got back to the car, grabbed our lunches and found a spot to eat. After lunch, we went in to explore the visitor’s center—this is one of the nicer/bigger ones we’ve been in and there were several exhibits to see, as well as binoculars to view Mt. Rainier up close. The crazy thing is that in the span of the hour, the fog rolled in and the mountain had literally disappeared, couldn’t see it at all! We felt very lucky that we had arrived that morning in time to see the unobstructed splendor of the mountain. The kids got their junior ranger badges and participated in some junior ranger activities that were happening.







We grabbed a few souvenirs at the gift shop and then made our way out of the park. The lady at the campground had told us the little town of Elbe was worth a look on the way back. We stopped at the Spirits of Iron Sculpture Park and wandered around looking at the amazing sculptures—so very cool!












Next we walked by the tiny, little church that holds only 20 people and thought we could ride the passenger train in town, but it had just left on the last trip for the day ☹ Instead we went into a little shop/café and the kids got ice cream, I had a lavender vanilla iced coffee, and Sean grabbed some local beers for later.


We got back to the campground in the late afternoon and sent the kids off to play while we cleaned up and I got some food prepped for dinner. I made salsa chicken in the instant pot and we had that with guacamole and some salad. It hit the spot! I enjoyed my Oregon huckleberry beer and the kids went to play soccer with some other kids while we watched boats racing on the lake.


Tomorrow the adventure continues!

Mt. Rainier Highlights 

BDG-seeing marmots fighting and seeing my rainier
KPG-Seeing Mt. Rainier and the waterfall (Christine Falls)
EAG-hiking through the meadows and seeing my rainier and glaciers from the top of the trail
SGG-seeing my rainier and the glaciers 

Location: Mount Rainier National Park, Washington, USA

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