Road Trip - North Cascades National Park

The North Cascades are often referred to as "The North American Alps" (Or something like that). Anyway, I don't think that name does them justice. We got to the park on July 18th and the mountains there are still ridiculously snow-capped and absolutely gorgeous. 

The first day we got to the park we were able to score a free campsite at a campground that only has seven sites! It was great to be in such a small campground, and to get it for free! Anyway, the first day was pretty uneventful other than our first views of some of the mountains, including the Pickett Range.

The Pickett Range

 

 

Our second day in the park we undertook a big hike to 4th of July Pass. Despite rain and semi-cold temps we made it out on the trail and up to the pass just in time for a small clearing in the weather and a view of the mountains and the Neve Glacier.

Near the beginning of the hike, not too wet yet

On our way up the mountain towards the pass, a little wetter now

The Neve Glacier from 4th of July Pass

A little bit closer look at the waterfalls tumbling from the base of the glacier

We were pretty exhausted after than 10 mile hike so we drove to the visitor center and watched the movie about the park. Overall I think it is the worst of the park movies we've seen so far, and by far the creepiest. There were quotes about nature flashing on the screen throughout the film and this eerie whispering female voice saying one or two words from them. Odd.

Anyway, we spent the rest of the evening hanging out at the campsite. The next morning we made our way out of the park and got some final views at a great overlook and from the trail to Cutthroat Lake.

Cutthroat Lake

So that was our trip to North Cascades National Park! We had a great time and added another park to the "Go Back There Someday" list. Now it's off to Spokane to visit my Aunt Jo, Uncle Mark, and my cousin Aldric!

Road Trip - Redwoods

So we only spent a few hours in Redwoods National Park and were only able to do one hike because the day was a total washout. On the way, however, we visited Drive Thru Tree Park where our Honda Fit (Sally, if you remember from previous posts) got to do a cool activity herself! We think she really enjoyed it.

Alot of these big Redwood trees have names, this one is called Chandelier tree and is 315 feet tall, 21 feet in diameter, and is estimated to be about 2400 years old. Crazy!

Anyway, after Sally had her fun we made our way to the national park where we were greeted by a downpour and a group of Roosevelt Elk grazing near the visitor center.

We headed up to Lady Bird Johnson Grove, named after the former first lady because of her efforts to preserve the big trees of California. There is a great little 1.5 miles loop hike around the grove where you get to see some pretty awesome trees, and, if you're lucky, you get rained on the whole time like we did :)

Me gazing up at a giant Redwood

Lacey taking shelter from the rain under a burned out Redwood

The grove during a small break in the downpour

More shelter under another burned out tree (Note my new Drive Thru Tree Park hat!)

One really huge tree

So that was the extent of our trip to Redwood National (and State) Parks. It would have been great to explore more, but we were soaked. We drove North through Crescent City and got a campsite on some Forest Service land. We got rained on all night and it was cold, not incredibly enjoyable. Stay tuned for another unexpected and not so pleasant adventure in the frozen tundra of Crater Lake National Park!

P.S. I forgot to mention in our Sequoia blog post about the Yellow Bellied Marmots we saw! They were everywhere and Lacey got some great pics. They are cute little guys, and we figured our friend Scott would enjoy the pics since he really wants to see one.