WA: Into the Ever Green

“That was the longest 4 hours of my life, recently,” Astrid remarked on getting off the plane in Seattle, Washington. It was not a good airplane flying day, she was slightly nauseous the whole time–probably because of her bifocals. It was the price she paid for wanting to see far away and read without changing glasses. They gave her the perception of too much movement in her visual field, triggering motion sickness. 

But the family was seated in the emergency exit aisle for their flight, so they had a little more responsibility in the event of an emergency, but a bit more leg room for every other event. 

Their first night’s stay was in a lovely hotel in an interesting part of Tacoma, Washington, in the shadow of a large casino. There were high fences around the whole parking lot, blinking blue lights of a mobile security camera tower; it was the “do not leave anything visible in your car” kind of place. Sirens blared in the distance. In the morning they drove by two people in the street looking for cigarette butts amongst the trash on the ground. 

Because their plane had been late the evening before, and Bjorn couldn’t get an online connection, they couldn’t reserve an early morning pass into the main part of Mt. Rainier National Park (MRNP) on recreation.gov, which meant, they could sleep in–they had no entrance time window to hit. 

On the drive to the park, Astrid experienced why Washington is “The Evergreen State.” Moving away from Tacoma, the land was full of dark green, piney evergreens–farmed and wild. Also, she saw boarded up hotels, un-housed encampments, neat little communities fenced in, small towns and fireweed along the wood-edged conifer forests. They stopped at a Safeway grocery store for jugs of water, snacks and lunch, then followed the road weaving through The Ever Green. 

Many national parks have timed passes, limited in number, but if a visitor is unable to get one, there are other, admittedly less popular, places to visit in the parks. Naches Peak Loop Trail was their first destination–maybe in the national park, maybe in the neighboring state park, Astrid and Bjorn weren’t sure, but it was certainly spectacular.

Every trail was crowded with wildflowers of fairytale intensity. Every green spot was dotted with white or pink or yellow flowers, and when the landscape flattened, there was a clear blue mountain lake, surrounded by little dots of color. The skies were a blessing of clear blue, the hills dark green, and snow capped the black mountains on the horizon. It was as if they were walking through the movie “The Sound of Music,” but without the weird songs about favorite things and following rainbows. 

Mt. Rainier was always visible as Astrid hiked, hiding just behind the tree line, over her right shoulder, but sometimes it was camouflaged by snow fields and glaciers streaking down its side, behind the whitest clouds. Piney fresh, cold aroma hung in the air, just subtle enough to note. Sparkly dust from footfalls on a powdery dirt trail wafted up as they walked; Astrid could feel the dust on her teeth.

It was Sunday, and beautiful, and a lot of people were out on the trails, but the spectacle of Alpine-like adventure wasn’t marred by crowds. There was plenty of room for all (though, as always, the parking lots were a squeeze).

The road to the next stop went under a tunnel, through more thick woods, into MRNP to Silver Falls Loop Trail . But there was little to no parking, so they headed on down to Packwood, WA, for a smashed penny, then to “lupper” (lunch and supper combined), at Santa Milagro Lodge Restaurant, and checked into their room at the Mountain View Lodge. 

They tried the Silver Falls Loop again, found parking and walked to the trail head which is in one of the park campgrounds. 

The family hiked the loop a little faster than normal, because they were on a schedule, but stopped briefly to capture or breathe in the scenery–earthy dark green conifers with light green nets of moss hanging from the branches, red-brown of their trunks, burnt orange of the dusty soil, grey-black boulders, deep cedar aromatics of a rotting log–with a blue-green river running through it all. The hike was soul-soaking wonderful. But Astrid observed an awe inspiring sight she did not expect on that hike.

Before she saw them, she heard them, “It’s soooooo beautiful! O my gosh! Wow!” Two young boys came hurrying toward the high bank as she stood on the bridge over the river. What impressed Astrid, was that they weren’t looking bored or angry their parents had wrenched them away from their screens. They could see the beauty, they could appreciate where. they. were. and what was all around them, and it made them exclaim–made them sing it out. They were so ecstatic about seeing the water fall in all its glory, so much, that it came out in unabashed verbal praise and wonder. Astrid loved to hear them, it was a beautiful thing. 

They finished the hike, made it back to their Mt. View Lodge, where the internet connection was best, with time to spare to get early morning passes for the next day into the main part of MRNP, to get a little closer to the mountain. 

Back in Packwood, WA, the closest little town, a restaurant near the Airstream Ice Cream shop was hosting live music outside for its patrons. A man on the guitar was singing Chance Peña’s “The Mountain is You.” It was so very loud, that Astrid and Snorri had to walk a distance away for comfort as they enjoyed their ice cream. 

It would be an early morning the next day, when they faced the mountain.

22147 steps. 

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