Trip Report: Mt. Rainier

Hurricane Ridge to Seaquest State Park


In the morning while we were breaking camp I looked across the loop at a group camp and saw their dog edging very close to a skunk! It was behind the picnic table, but I could see the black and white tail. I grabbed Brett and said "What do we do?!" - in a few seconds that golden retriever would be soaked - and the whole group was piled in one SUV. EWWW. Before we could decide if we should try to call the dog and wake up the whole campground doing it, the skunk came out from around the table. It was their rat dog! They had a black and white dog with a poofy tail! LOL so glad we didn't try to intervene. :D

We decided to skip some of the towns on the east side of the 101 loop and just get on the road back towards Mt Rainier. Unfortunately the Hood River Canal Bridge was out for construction. So we had to drive through those towns whether we wanted to or not. :) It wasn't a bad drive but it did extend the driving time by several hours and force us to skip Seattle. We did stop for coffee in the general area at a couple of those espresso shacks and Brett thought they were excellent.

When we got to Mt Rainier, where we had planned to camp after the long day of driving, we found that pretty much the entire park was closed except for the one road leading up to the brand new visitors center. When we drove by the campground, the reason for the closure was fairly obvious - there was at least 3 feet of snow in the camp area. In the meantime, we went to the visitors center and I got a stamp. While I was in line to talk to a ranger about other stamp opportunities (can't miss any, you know?) a guy in Tevas and jeans walked to the counter and said "How do I summit?" The park ranger blinked a little and they went back and forth until the ranger realized that the guy was seriously wanting to know what path/route to take to get to the summit. The ranger should get award for being patient and kind. He pulled out a topo map and tried to gently show the guy that there are several mountaineering routes up and that they all cross glacial fields with VERY high chances of avalanches this time of year, hoping to dissuade him. The guy instead got upset when the ranger wouldn't GIVE him the topo map. The ranger said that he needed to buy his own, since that was the office's copy. He said he'd head to the gift shop to get one and the ranger told him that they don't sell the topo maps with the routes on them. He demanded to know why and the ranger - at the very limit of his patience, took a deep breath and said "because people who are going to mountaineer to the top of a 14000' peak plan their route long in advance". I died laughing. I think he heard me because he finally left the counter. If he hadn't I was just about to say "look buddy, the peak is up there. Start walking." It was so funny.

Since we didn't have a place to stay in Rainier, we stopped and saw a fall that the one open road went by (but the trail to actually view it was closed due to snow) and then headed out of the park towards Mt. St. Helens.

There are 3 visitors centers for Mt St Helens. We just wanted to stop at the one closest to the interstate and grab a spoon and a stamp for the NPS book. We made good time and found a WA state park right across the street from the Silver Lake Vistors Center and stayed there. It turned out to be a great choice because unlike all the other campgrounds on the trip, these had showers! After that many days without a shower, it was GLORIOUS even if my tokens for hot water didn't actually get me the full 3 minutes they were supposed to. :) Note to self - next time pack the no-rinse shampoo. :D

Links to pics here