Small Thoughts: More Reasons To Love the PNW!

One of the things I like most about Washington is the ability to visit multiple national parks and national forest areas in a day trip. Mt Rainier National Park, Olympic National Park, North Cascades National Park, Mt St Helens National Monument and several very good state parks are all within a couple of hours of our house. We have been successful convincing the other 49 states that it rains 364 days a year, so the parks are typically not too crowded unless you go to the obvious tourist stops on the obvious visiting days.

Olympic National Park is a gem. The way the park is situated on the Olympic Peninsula creates several distinctly different smaller parks. Rain forests, mountains, river valleys - you want it, you got it. I have not spent enough time up there in the past and plan to change it this year. I only have a couple more years with my hiking buddy in the house so I have to make the best of it.

I visited two of the parks this past weekend. On Friday I went hiking in Olympic NP with Melissa and Danny in the Staircase area. On Sunday I went for a ride through North Cascades NP on my bike. Both days were fantastic, although Sunday verged on being too hot. I have found that I can comfortably ride in temps up to 90F with all my gear on as long as I stay moving. Anything above that and I get too hot. I saw temps at 100F on Sunday - thankfully not the entire ride!

Looking upstream of Enloe Dam in north central Washington.

Washington Pass in North Cascades National Park. The weather was warm verging on hot!

Looking out on North Cascades National Park from near Washington Pass on US 20.

A photo op in North Cascades National Park.

Our hike on Friday was great! It is pretty easy to get to the trailhead at Staircase. A nice drive that includes about 10 miles of well maintained gravel ends at a ranger station with ample parking. We went a little over a mile out and then turned around. A nice picnic lunch wrapped up the day.