Trip to Mt. Rainier - Part 2

The weather was gorgeous the whole time we were there, and we went on several different trails.
Steps in the snow to get from one part of a trail to another part.
This guy was playing the piano in the lobby of the hotel at Paradise. We ate lunch there and he played the whole time.
I loved the wildflowers and kept trying to take the perfect picture of them.
These are called Jeffrey Shooting Star flowers.
Time to take a break and read awhile on the porch of the lodge.
Ken standing on a bridge over the Nisqually River.
Christine Falls and neat stone bridge in the background.
I was taking this picture of the mountains and valley, when Ken said,"Slowly look over your left shoulder." It kind of freaked me out at first, but when I looked, I saw...
...this marmot. It looks a lot different from the other one we saw. It wasn't afraid of us unless we moved a little, then it would retreat a couple of inches, but come right back. While I was taking a picture of it, Ken said...
..."There's a bear in the valley." We drove to the other side of the valley, where you could see it a little bit better, watched it awhile and took a bunch of pictures, then drove on down the road...
...where some other cars were parked, watching another bear!
Later in the evening, we were parked by Reflection Lake when a deer popped out of the woods and crossed the road. We felt very lucky that we got to see so much wildlife!

Trip to Mt. Rainier - Part 1

After dropping Wendy and Dale off at the airport on Saturday morning, we went to Mt. Rainier and spent a couple of nights there. We stayed at a lodge in the park in the area called Longmier.
This is the type of touring car that they used to take people around the park in.
The lodge we stayed in had a lovely porch to sit on with a nice view of the mountain. Ken put his feet up for awhile, before we went on a short walk.
Our walk was around a bubbling pond, caused by underground gasses, where a spa was developed in the early 1900's. We saw this evidence of beavers at work, but didn't see any beavers or a beaver dam.
When we got to the other side of the pond, we saw this mound. I thought someone had raked up pine needles into a pile, but on closer look, it turned out to be covered with ants and they are the ones that created the pile.
The next morning, we took the shuttle bus up to the area called Paradise. We were told that the wildflowers are usually at their peak the last week of July or the first week of August. This year they are late, just like everything else around here, and some of the early blooming plants like the Avalanche Lily above were still in bloom.
Wildflowers in bloom.
As we started one of our hikes, we spotted this fawn playing in the water.
Right above the snow towards the middle of the picture is Camp Muir, where people stay overnight before hiking to the summit of Mt. Rainier. We didn't know it when we took it, but if you zoom in enough you can see people on the snow.
I couldn't stop taking pictures of Mt. Rainier, it's so picturesque with the streams, flowers, etc.
This flower is a Marsh Marigold.
This animal was pointed out to us, but no one knew for sure what it was. When you zoom in on it, it almost looks like a miniature male lion with the mane around his head. We showed the picture to a ranger later and he said it was a woolly marmot.

More Texans Visit - Part 3

Friday, the last day of Wendy and Dale's visit, we decided to go for a hike that we used to go on with our kids when they were younger. First we made a stop at the Jordan Bridge and took a walk across the bridge, then we drove out to the head of the Old Robe Trail, where we ate our picnic lunch in the car before starting our hike.
We had another gorgeous day for our hike. Wendy and Dale kept being amazed that we were able to be outdoors doing activities, since they stay indoors most of the time where they live because of the heat during summer.
Ferns growing up the tree trunks.
Some berries growing along the path, anyone know what kind they are?
The trail seemed to be different from when we used to go with the kids 25 years ago. One of the changes was that you couldn't go all the way to the old railroad tunnels along the trail. (Ken and Dale did go on past the sign to the first tunnel, but said that there was no way you could get to the second tunnel.)

More Texans Visit - Part 2

While we waited for the crabs to climb into the traps, we spent time playing on the beach. I helped Annika make a road with the rocks on the beach, then Papa came along and helped her drive her "car" (which was her flip flops) along the roads.
A bathing beauty on the beach.
Since Saben couldn't catch any fish, he switched to looking for little rock crabs under the rocks, both Papa and Wendy spent time helping him look, but he found most of them by himself.
Kari was going to take Saben for a ride in one of the kayaks, but the water was to rough, so she brought him back.
Saben saw some friends from school and played with them awhile. I tried taking this picture through the branches of a big tree.
After bringing the traps in to shore, we only had 6 crabs that were the right size and sex to be keepers. Later a friend of the Young's brought a few more over, so we had plenty for dinner. This is the platter of the 6 crabs we caught.
Wow, what a plate of crab shells! Did Dale eat all of those crabs himself?
Saben made sure the fire in the fire pit kept going.

More Texans Visit - Part 1

We picked up Wendy (Ken's sister) and her husband, Dale, on Wednesday in Vancouver after their Alaska cruise. Ken and I spent the night in Vancouver on Tuesday, so we would be sure to be on time to pick them up Wednesday morning. Tuesday night, after fighting the traffic going into Vancouver, we had a wonderful dinner outside in a waterfront restaurant, followed by a walk along the waterfront area. After picking Wendy and Dale up at the cruise ship terminal, we walked over to show them the Olympic cauldron. (I forgot to bring my camera and was totally bummed that I didn't get to take pictures of it or our time at the Vancouver Aquarium.) We hadn't been to the aquarium in years and we all really enjoyed it, we also, got to see our first ever 4D movie. It was cool to feel the wind, water spraying on our face and various other effects as we sat in the theater.

Thursday, we went to Bellingham, met Kari and the kids, then headed out to do some crabbing. Kari is showing Dale how the crab trap works.

Getting all the equipment ready to go.
The salmon scraps we put in the traps to lure the crabs.
The salmon also, lured the seagulls to the traps.
Saben caught a little green grasshopper in his net,...
...both kids had nets and wanted to catch some little fish in them, but didn't have any luck catching fish.
Ken, Kari, and Dale went and got some kayaks that they rented.
Getting ready to take the crab traps out.
The crab traps are going out.

Arrived in Arlington

We had seen that this artifact from the World Trade Center was arriving on Saturday at about 12:30pm, so we decided to go down and watch the arrival. It was not a really exciting event. I thought they would slowly drive down main street and there would be a lot of people out to see its arrival, with cheering and flag waving. In reality, they drove fairly quickly down the street, there were a few people attending with some flags and not much cheering. I also thought we'd see the actual artifact, not the container it's in. Oh, well, maybe we'll see it when they dedicate it in September.

Hot Air Balloon Ride - Part 3

OK, this is the last of the hot air balloon pictures, unless I post the group photo that the pilot took while we were in the balloon, but it's not been posted on their web site yet. I took this picture after we saw an airplane fly under our balloon, it's the tiny white speck on the green towards the middle of the picture. It was weird flying above the airplane.
A bend in the river.
We weren't sure we were going to make it over these trees, but we easily went up and over, kind of through the gap in the trees.
We had great views of Mt. Rainier from the time we took off.
Sun is setting.
Time to come down.
We came down on the other side of the road from the Bob's Corn maze,...
...into a pasture with horses in it. The horses weren't to happy to see us! Notice the clouds of dust they stirred up while running around as we landed. You horse people, can you imagine your horse's reaction to a hot air balloon landing in your pasture! Apparently, they land the balloons there quite often. I couldn't believe the people that owned the horses let them do that.
Emptying the balloon of air.
The horses kept a close eye on the balloon as it deflated!
After the ride was over, we went back to the balloon company's office for a yummy dinner of lasagna, salad, and garlic bread. It was probably 9:30 by the time we got back, so we were all starving and the food tasted great! I even got a birthday cake for dessert. Everyone also got this certificate, which basically says that we went up in a hot air balloon. It's done in french because the french were the first to do hot air ballooning.