Sledding in July

We wanted to do some hiking while we were here so we decided that today we'd go to Mt. Rainier and do something there. Even though my friend Greg has been living in Seattle since last September, he hasn't made it to Rainier yet so he was happy to come with us. After meeting us at our hotel at about 7:30 AM, we decided that we'd go to the most popular part of Rainier and do the hike that is probably the most recommended. That meant doing the Skyline Trail Loop at Paradise and it certainly did not disappoint!

It was a two hour drive up and when we left it was cloudy, although the forecast said it'd clear up during the day. As we arrived at the Paradise Visitor Center, it was busy but at least there were parking spaces. While it was still pretty cloudy - and thus you couldn't see any mountains - the sun was starting to show through at times so we were hopeful that it would clear soon. We stopped at the gift shop, got Jess her stamp and bought a few drinks before moving our car to a different lot (since we'd be there for hours) and heading out on the hike. We spoke to a ranger beforehand and she warned that there was still snow in parts but she said the entire 5.5-mile loop was passable if a bit challenging.

The beginning of the hike was paved but it was pretty steep. We knew we'd gain about 1700 feet in elevation but at least a good chunk of that was at the beginning. After we got off the paved part, we were basically in the clouds so visibility wasn't great. We could see short distances which meant snow, wildflowers and marmots galore. We hadn't seen marmots in person during our other trips and this time they were right by the trails and didn't seem concerned that people were right next to them. We also saw a lot of fat chipmunks too.

The trail itself was pretty steep and was tough for Jess at times because the stretches between rocks and steps were sometimes pretty wide and her legs are short. It was very rocky and uneven and steep at almost all points during the first half of the hike. There were a few less rocky parts but that meant it was either kind of sandy or there was snow. Yep, it turned out that even in July, large stretches of the trail were completely covered by snow. Thankfully there were flags and you could follow the footsteps to see which way to go but it was very easy to get a little off course.

We climbed up about 1400 feet to the major veiwpoint of Panoramic Point but unfortunately it was still cloudy so we couldn't see anything in front of us. Behind us was the peak of Rainier, and after stopping for a few minutes to eat lunch, the sky cleared slightly and Rainier was briefly visible. It was pretty amazing although it didn't look as big I expected but that was mostly because we were halfway up and there were still clouds to the side of it.

The clouds came and went rapidly so we left and tried to get up above the clouds and hope for better views. After a short distance, we got to a point where the mountain was completely visible where again, it was only for a short time but we sat there for a while and got to see it come in and out of view a few times. When it was visible, you could definitely see the glaciers up top and the blue hues looked amazing. I did manage to drop our camera and of course it fell down about 10 feet, bouncing off rocks on the way down. It didn't work at first when I got it back but thankfully Greg had this happen to him before and it just required some adjustment to the lens. It seems like it still worked (after all, that's where most of these pictures came from) so we continued on.

After hiking up a couple hundred feet to the high point of the trail, we walked along a giant mound of snow. I think it was a glacier but can't be sure. We saw a huge mountain goat - which I first thought was another snow mound - just sitting there along with people practicing and preparing along the snow below the trail for what I assume was a summit attempt. At this point, the ranger had said there were areas of more snow so we expected that somewhat but there was definitely more than we bargained for. While we thought the uphill parts were tough, it was a lot harder climbing down the snowy steep parts.

Lucky for us, there were a couple people that decided they would use their jackets or a garbage bag to sled down. They may have gotten a little wet doing it but considering you're likely to fall anyway, it seemed like a good idea. The guy offered us an extra garbage bag and we took it. It turns out sledding on that works and is a lot faster and easier to get the down the hills! We took turns sledding at various points and while you didn't have a lot of control, it definitely worked (and was a lot of fun). Here's a video of Greg on one his slides:


(And yes, I'm an idiot for not shooting it landscape.)

We did have to cross a couple of streams too. It wasn't like they were moving that quickly or were deep but you definitely could get your feet completely soaked like I did. There was no clear path through it so you had to guess at which rocks wouldn't move and would stay near the water line. It wasn't easy to stay dry but we all made it with no one falling into the water.

The trail down wasn't that bad and we ended up getting more great views once we got below the clouds. We also saw more marmots sunning themselves on the rocks and the snow. When we were at about mile 6 of the hike (somehow we ended up doing nearly 7 miles so we must have meandered around a lot in addition to the hike from the parking lot to the trailhead), we had to go back up a steep area to get back to the visitor center. We also saw a group of people carrying out a gurney with something tied up in a bag. We think it was a training session but they didn't say that so we don't know if they were recovering a body (though I later checked the news and didn't see anything about it).

When we got close to the trail's end, we saw a nice waterfall and there were a few deer grazing by the path. We were all pretty tired - it ended up being an 11-hour day in total, which was longer than we had planned on - so when we got back to the hotel, we parted ways with Greg and took it easy the rest of the night. It also turned out that despite being below or in the clouds much of the day, we were out long enough that I got badly sunburned so that wasn't terribly comfortable once it really set in.

As they say on Rainier, "You've reached the summit when you're about halfway up." Note: No one says this.

Escape from the Heat

It was an uneventful flight yesterday evening so the trip got off to a good start. After waking up this morning to cool temps, it was certainly nice to get away from the high 90's (heat and humidity) and have some more reasonable weather for a change.

We had the morning and early afternoon before we were meeting our friends so we decided to head downtown and hit a few spots. We stopped at Pike Place Market first and checked out all of the vendors there. There was art, flowers, food, fish, crafts...basically anything you can sell from a stand. We did end up picking up a nice small piece of art before heading over to the Seattle Art Museum. It was very busy though since this is peak tourist season and we wanted to get away from there before it got even worse.

The museum itself was huge and had a lot of different things from modern art to silver and furniture. No one area had that much by itself but it definitely had a large variety. I admit a lot of the modern stuff is not my cup of tea but some things like the porcelain rooms - with the teacups - were at least somewhat interesting.

After a decent lunch at a brewpub near the market, we walked around a little more before heading back to the hotel to kill an hour or so before heading to Mark and Laurel's house to see them and meet their baby!

I've worked with Mark since 2006 and his wife Laurel also worked at the same company. They moved to Seattle and had a baby last year so this was our first time meeting her. She was great the entire evening - nothing but smiles and laughs. She just learned to crawl too so I think she was happy to show off her new skills.

They made us dinner - pizza (they know my eating habits) and salad - and after a delightful time there, we headed back to our hotel since we had an early morning on Thursday.

As they say in the tourist areas, "That'll be $20 for a hamburger." Note: They do say this.

Better Late Than Never

It's always the intent to post blogs every day on our trip but sometimes late days or bad connections mean we have a couple of delays. On this trip, I think most of the internet was satellite based and we couldn't upload pictures at all. Since the pictures really tell the story, we decided to write the blogs as we went along but wait until we were home to post them.With getting sick and being lazy, it took two weeks but at least they're up there now...

Bye Bye!

We were up early and took the bus back to the airport in Vancouver.  Because we went from the cruise directly to the airport, we didn't have to go through Canadian customs and they had our bags waiting for us right inside the terminal. Unfortunately, our flight to Chicago was already delayed twice when we got there so when we went to check in, we could change our flight (at a cost to us, of course) but it did leave about 2 hours earlier. We only had about an hour and a half before the flight left at that point but I figured with a tight layover, if the flight was delayed once more we'd be in trouble. I decided to go for it and we rushed to go through security and US customs. We did make it in time but there were two problems: first, we didn't have time to eat so all I could get were some snacks and some Timnits from Tim Hortons. Second, we weren't sitting together.

One last look at the webcam from the front of the ship...

When the plane boarded, I was hoping the guy in the aisle next to my middle seat would be sitting alone and therefore wouldn't mind trading for the aisle seat Jess had a few rows back. When I got there, he had actually moved to the middle seat to sit next to his wife so that didn't work. Thankfully the guy across from me was traveling alone so he agreed to move so at least Jess and I were near each other. The flight wasn't bad except it was storming in DC so we were late to land and they forgot to load the snacks on the plane so it was a good thing I bought a couple things beforehand.

The trip from DC to Raleigh was quick and uneventful and even though we didn't get home until about 1:45 AM, it could have been worse. It turns out our flight to Chicago got there after our flight to Raleigh left so there's a good chance we would have been stuck there overnight.

After a long 2+ weeks, it was nice to get back to Raleigh. It did seem extra warm considering it's been pretty cool for us since we left. In fact, even in the middle of the night it was about 10 degrees warmer than at any point in our trip. After talking about this trip for years, it lived up to our expectations and I have a feeling we'll be back at some point.

As our captain Michele Tuvo said after each announcement, "Bye Bye!" Note: He really did sign off that way, but just imagine it in a cheery Italian accent.

Star Princess

Last night, the sea were angry, my friends. It has been a pretty smooth trip so far and for most of the time, you could barely feel that you were on the ocean. That changed last night as the winds picked up along with the rain and the ship was moving side to side more than we had felt the entire time. Even though there were visible swells, it still wasn't too bad and that's with neither of us taking any kind of motion sickness medicine. I've never really had motion sickness and with all of the boats we took this trip, I'm not really worried about it as long as the seas aren't too rough. We also saw darkness for the first time in 2 weeks. We either had gone to bed early because of an early morning or it stayed light out so late that we hadn't seen actual darkness for the entire time we've been here. With us approaching PDT and moving south, it got dark around 10 PM so by the time we went to bed, it was actually pitch black out there.

We crossed over into Canadian waters and changed time zones overnight. It was just an "At Sea" day as we approached Vancouver so we only did a few things on the ship. We started out by packing up because our luggage has to be out the door this evening since they are taking our bags on a bus with us to the airport. There was then an ocean-themed watercolor class that we went down for and it turned out it was a team painting. I even got in on it because one of the teams was down a few people; if I do say so, we won the competition. We happened to see Pat and Eileen out and about and set up plans for dinner with a bunch of folks from our tour. As Jess did a card-making class, I walked around and took some pictures of the ship so that we could remember it years from now:

I lost money here.

To combat our overeating, we took the stairs all the time

We ended up eating mostly at the buffet place.

On the way we passed an area where there is more marine wildlife and we did see more Dall porpoises swimming right near the ship. After cashing out at the casino (Jess was even and I...was not), we were going to have dinner with everyone but with Jess's cold getting worse, we decided to not get everyone else sick and so we went back to our room, got our bags out to the hallway and then went to bed before a somewhat-early rise to go to the airport.

I found that the cruise was ok but it's not really my thing as I like to be out at parks and even if we're in touristy areas, we can get some alone time in the car or out in nature. There's so many people always around and most people were rude (cutting in front when in line for no real reason, not saying "Thank You" when holding doors for people. etc.). It also seemed like everything was about gift shops and shopping in general with overpriced crap. The other thing is that everything with the cruise is so cheesy...sure, be a little lame with some bad jokes once in a while but the constant cheese was a bit much after a few days. Case in point: the video that plays on one of the channels was a "Love Boat" spoof with the original actors. But it wasn't even clever! Just like "Love Boat", I guess. I would do one again in warmer weather but it wouldn't be my first choice in the future.

Overall it was a great trip that we'll never forget but I'm ready to be home.

As Jess says after I painted, "That fish was mediocre." Note: She was correct - it was a pretty poorly painted fish.