For this week’s photo challenge I bring to you a sunset over the Strait of Juan de Fuca from a recent cruise to Alaska.
Sunset Glow
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Tag Archives: Washington State
Surprised by Rainforest
This week we happened upon the Temperate Rainforest of the Carbon River Valley just inside the remote northwest corner of Mt. Rainier National Park and enjoyed a lovely walk through the woods. Who knew?
Blessed to have all this so close to home!
~ Susanne
Scenes from a day at the Fair!
And a full day it was at the Washington State Fair, formerly and affectionately known as the Puyallup Fair, by all who grew up here! We arrived just after the gates opened and stayed until the sun had set. We walked what seemed like miles around the grounds enjoying the sights, the sounds, the tastes, the colors, the animals, vendors, and aromas of the Fair, just as we have each year for as long as I can remember. The pictures tell all, I think.
~ Susanne
Apples and Dahlias and Tiger in the Garden
Today I took a stroll through my garden and this is what I saw.
The Apple
One would think it’s easy to grow apples in Washington State, a major exporter of the delicious crop. One would be wrong (unless one lives in Wenatchee which calls itself the Apple Capital of the World.)
I planted a semi dwarf apple tree two years ago in my garden, and added another pollinator tree this year. I was encouraged to see several promising apples earlier in the spring. See picture below for the only healthy apple that remains on my tree. I’m hoping it will not go the way of the others, scabby and dropping prematurely to the earth. I will give it a few more days before I harvest it. I plan to savor every bite.
The Dahlias
The dahlias on the other hand, are at their best this month, faithful and eager to please.
I cannot take credit for them. These came from my mom’s garden a few years ago and she even planted them. The (expensive) ones I planted next to them earlier this spring did not come up; maybe they were waterlogged from the record rainfall this year.
Tiger
This is Tiger with the lone healthy apple.
Here he is again in the barren spot which had been allotted to the aforementioned dahlias that failed to appear this year.
And that is all from today’s walk through the garden.
~ Susanne
Just Another Day Trip to Mt. Rainier, at Mowich Lake
We’ve visited Mt. Rainier more times this year than any other that I can remember. Maybe we’re finally taking full advantage of not working? (Okay, we’re retired, though I don’t like that word.) Or maybe it finally dawned on us how very close and accessible that wonderful Mountain is? Today we got off to a late start and when we arrived in Enumclaw, we learned the route ahead on Highway 410 was closed. No matter. We put Plan B into effect and headed south on State Route 165 to the less frequented Northwest corner of the Park. Into the wilderness and onto a gravelly, pitted road we went (oh yes it was) towards Mowich Lake. The views of the mountain were worth it.
After 11 miles of a bumpy, dusty, ride, we entered the National Park without any fanfare, save a self-service box for the entry fee, and a sign that told us we were in for a rough ride up the gravel road. (Yeah, we noticed; next time we’ll bring the truck.) Dusty cars lined the side of the road the last two miles, and we realized just how popular the area was to the locals. Still we carried on and arrived at Mowich Lake (el. 4,929 ft.), where my husband kindly dropped me off while he went to park the car, his first hike of the day.
Notwithstanding the number of cars, peace could still be found in secluded spots next to the pristine lake, the largest and deepest in the National Park. The temperature was in the nineties so the smart ones were swimming or boating in the lake.
The trails in the area are part of the Wonderland Trail that encircles the base of the mountain for 93 miles. We saw a few well equipped hikers on the trail hiking 12 to 15 miles a day (sturdy young men with large backpacks, strong legs and determination), but mostly we saw day hikers like ourselves opting for shorter hikes, including families with children.
We stopped to eat our snack in a shady spot on the lake, before taking the hike to Ipsut Pass, which followed the lake through the woods, providing great views of the Mountain, before turning away and gaining some elevation.
On the trail up to the Pass we encountered many hikers coming down, mostly from Eunice Lake which was further than we intended to go.
‘How much farther?’ we would ask and always got the same general answer. Eunice Lake and Tolmie Peak were a couple of grueling miles further but well worth it (though not to us.) Ipsut Pass being half as far, was ‘just a little bit further’, ‘maybe 3 more switchbacks ahead’ and the trail was ‘not too steep’ though ‘rocky and rooty,’ a description I rather enjoyed. I suggested to my husband that we stop asking ‘how much farther’ as it only disappointed us when the estimates proved inaccurate.
Still, the camaraderie with other hikers is what makes hiking fun and that was the easiest thing to say to one another. One family coming down had two little girls, covered with dirt from the dusty trail, no more than five years of age, and cute as can be. They had come from Eunice Lake.
“How much further?” one of them asked us.
“You have a way to go to the bottom,” I replied having already learned the disappointment of bad estimates, “and actually we were going to ask you that very question!”
While we were chatting, she glanced at my watch and her eyes lit up as she exclaimed, “Oh what a beautiful watch! A blue watch! Blue is my favorite color!”
Charmed by her exuberance, I was almost tempted to give her the (cheap) watch. She surely appreciated it more than I did.
As they moved on down the trail she hollered back to me, “I love your necklace!” and I had to laugh.
We continued on under the shade and cover of the woods, though one short section sent us into the brilliant sunshine and onto a ledge with craggy rocks above, where the trail overlooked the valley below.
Shortly afterwards we passed the cutoff to Eunice Lake, and arrived at Ipsut Pass, a rocky area which dropped sharply below us where the Wonderland Trail continued on.
After a quick visit with a couple of backpackers who were taking the pass down to the Yellowstone Cliffs for the night, we headed back finding the way much faster and easier than coming up.
Back to the car and down the dusty, bumpy road we went, but not without a stop for another view and photo of the Mountain.
The long summer drought shows on her. But it won’t be long until winter will return and the mountain will be covered with snow once again.
Looking forward to it.
~ Susanne
Wonderful Whidbey Island
Forgive me in advance for overdoing it with the ‘W’s, but we had a Wonderful visit to Whidbey Island on Wednesday this Week! Since my husband and I are no longer working (I don’t like the “r” word; retired sounds old, even to me) we like to take mid-week excursions and avoid the crowds and traffic. This week we opted for a day trip to Whidbey Island, an hour or so north of Seattle.
On the way we stopped by Anacortes, an unassuming working town on Fidalgo Island, known mainly as the gateway to the San Juan Islands.
From Fidalgo Island we crossed over to Whidbey Island at Deception Pass. The view from above is amazing but neither of us had the courage to cross the bridge on foot. With the skinny walkway and at 181 feet, it’s too high up for us!
On the other side, we stopped by Deception Pass State Park, the most visited state park in Washington, complete with campgrounds, beaches, lakes, hikes, and views of the bridge.
Then it was on to the charming town of Coupeville, first laid out in the 1850’s and part of Ebey’s Landing National Historic Reserve.
In downtown Coupeville, Penn Cove has great views of the floating Mt. Baker to the north.
The next stop was Fort Casey. According to the Washington State Parks website: “Constructed in the late 1800s, Fort Casey was equipped for defense and used as a training facility up to the mid-1940s. The fort houses a pair of rare 10-inch disappearing guns. While the guns were the height of technology in the early 1900s, improvements in warships and the advent of airplanes soon rendered them obsolete.”
A boy’s playground, no?
We left the fort as the cloudy sky was preparing for sunset.
We headed toward Clinton on the southern end of the island where we took the ferry to Mukilteo, for dinner and home, just as the sun was setting.
A wonderful Wednesday trip!
~ Susanne
Solar Eclipse – Will You Watch it?
Yes, I knew it was coming; they’ve been talking about it for months. That once in a lifetime event on Monday August 21, 2017, a solar eclipse coming to a neighborhood near you! Once in a lifetime, counting from when the last total solar eclipse crossed the contiguous USA in 1918. But those from the Northwest may recall the eclipse in 1979, something of a non-event in the Seattle area because of cloudy skies. Clear skies are in the forecast for Monday, so this will be something to see. Or not, read on.
No, Seattle is not in the path of totality; for that we’d have to travel to Oregon, along with the other billions so headed, resulting in unprecedented traffic, which for this area is saying a lot. Honestly, I’m not that desperate.
Still, according to those in the know, we will experience 93% totality here, that time when the moon will almost completely block out the sun, starting at 9:08 am and bringing darkness at 10:20 a.m. Silly girl, don’t you want to see that?? Of course I do! Oh why then did I wait so long to get those eclipse glasses? The event of a lifetime overhead but I can’t look up!
There are still a few places this weekend where they will be handing out the coveted glasses until supplies run out. I will head to one of them and hope for the best. We shall see (no pun intended.) If I’m not one of the lucky ones, I guess I could build my own viewing device no matter how hokey it may appear; instructions abound on the internet. But is watching a shadow on a piece of cardboard really the same? I think not.
For a planner like me, I sure blew this one. How about the rest of you? Do you have plans to watch the solar eclipse?
~ Susanne
