Dry Falls State Park, Washington

The friend who told us about the wolf encounter in Colorado Springs also told us that we needed to check out Dry Falls State Park in Washington.  It's not far from Coulee Dam, and if you are in the area, it's worth a quick stop.

Basically, if there were still water flowing, it would be the biggest waterfall in the world.  But it's dry, so while there isn't the beauty of rushing water, the mystery of the dry falls is pretty fascinating!

Seattle

Our campground at Kanaskat-Palmer State Park, outside of Seattle, definitely ranks as one of the prettiest places that I've ever camped.  The rain forest is so lush and green!  Of course, it rained a lot while we were there, but I guess that's why it's so green.

We had perfect weather for my marathon on Saturday, gray skies with a little drizzle and fairly cool temperatures, but once we went to bed Saturday night, the clouds broke loose and we spent the night in a rain storm, albeit snug in our tent.  Sunday morning we made a mad dash for the car, and spent the day indoors, driving to Seattle.

We spent the morning touring Boeing, where cameras are only allowed in the exhibit hall, not in the factory, but it was a pretty cool tour.  The factory building we were in is ranked by Guiness as the largest building (by volume) in the world.  From up on the observation walk, the 777s looked almost toy-sized, and it was really neat to see the grand scale of it all.  We also got to see a brand new Korean Air plane take off on one of its first test flights.

In the afternoon, we visited the Pacific Science Center, another science-focused children's museum associated with the one at which we are members.  It is so fun being able to drop in on museums without having to worry about the admission fee!  As with most of the museums which are members of the Association of Science and Technology Centers, the exhibits are well done, and we enjoyed an informative afternoon.

On Monday, we spent a day hiking on the trails of Taylor Mountain.  It rained for most of our morning jaunt, but the sun came out by lunch time, and we had a great time on the river of Kanaskat-Palmer State Park in the afternoon.

(This is the creek I crossed during the marathon.)

Marathon #50!

I ran my 50th marathon or ultra-marathon (foot race longer than 26.2 miles) at the end of June at the gorgeous Taylor Mountain Trail Marathon outside Issaquah, Washington.  Kudos to Evergreen Racing for an absolutely phenomenal race, and thanks to Juan Montermoso for the creek crossing photos!

Hans and Miriam worked at an aid station during this race, and were kept busy cheering, taking pictures, and putting out food and drinks for the runners.  They had a great time, and were apparently pretty useful volunteers, although they report feeling bad that their enthusiastic cowbell ringing scared one of the horses also on the trail that morning.

Hans was waiting at the finish line for me to come in (at long last).  What a beautiful location!

Portland, Oregon

Our time in Portland was spent visiting close friends, and we spent most of our time hanging out at home rather than doing anything "touristy".  We did enjoy a walk around downtown, having some gourmet chocolate, visiting an electric car showroom, and buying lunch from the food-trucks.  My favorite truck from two years ago is still going strong...I can't wait to master this recipe myself, at least this time I remembered to take a picture of it!

We spent an afternoon at Oaks Park, mostly roller skating.  It's a lot harder than I remember it being thirty-some years ago!  It took awhile, and I suspect I was a bit less than graceful, but eventually I managed to find my groove...and at least I never fell!  

It's a beautiful old roller rink in one of the oldest continuously operating amusement park in the country.  The old organ wasn't playing (and the DJ did not play any of our requests), but we had a great time on the historic "floating" floor.  Following a flood in the 1940s, the roller rink was re-built on a platform of barrels, and while you can't tell that it's floating now, they have succeeded in saving the floor from two later floods!

Nevada & Idaho

After Shosone Falls, we spent a few days in rural northern Nevada, in the Lamoille Canyon area around Elko.  The mountains were beautiful, and I ran one of the prettiest road marathon's I've ever ran there.  We had a good hike, and despite a rainy evening, had a nice campfire and good night's sleep.

The man who came into the restaurant where we were enjoying breakfast didn't look much like Sherriff Taylor, but his car was perfect for the part!

We spent some time at the Northeastern Nevada Museum while the car was in the shop.  This car was the only one, to Hans' disappointment, but the historical and art exhibits were both interesting.  Also a room positively full of taxidermy, with more animals on display than many zoos!

Back in Idaho, we visited with some close friends (two families) who we haven't seen in over six years...it's amazing how much the kids have all grown!  They didn't really remember each other, of course, but settled in and had a great weekend playing with their "cousins".  From here, we're off to Portland to see more friends!

Craters of the Moon National Park

After breaking camp on yet another 25 degree morning, we drove towards the west exit of Yellowstone and a nice hot breakfast, making a few stops along the way.  Less than four hours away from Yellowstone, but with something like 1/100 of the visitors, is the amazingly otherworldly Craters of the Moon National Park.  We peeled off our layers as we headed south and out of the mountains, and made our way back to the high desert and the sage brush, and then the lava rocks.

 

Craters of the Moon is a huge park – about the size of Rhode Island – comprised of the remnants of volcanoes from about 2000 years ago.  Since the scientists estimate that these volcanoes erupt roughly every 2000 years, it does make any stay a bit tense, but they held for another week and we had a great chance to explore the moon.  Or at least the same terrain that the original moon-landing astronauts practiced on before going to the moon, and which NASA even still uses to this day.

We spent Tuesday and Wednesday hiking and enjoying two peaceful nights’ sleep with mild temperatures, clear skies, and unlike our first two campgrounds of the trip, no train tracks running right along side them.  

I love looking at volcanic rock, and the way it reminds me of brownie batter swirling in the pan, but my favorite part is the flowers struggling to come up through the cracks. It was a long winter and a wet spring here, according to the rangers, so its not quite the high season for the flowers, but the ones that had bloomed were beautiful.  (For more volcano pictures, look back at the 2017 blog photos from the Big Island of Hawaii).

On Wednesday afternoon we explored the caves.  And I want to be sure to point out (because I want full credit when it comes to the Mother-of-the-Year judging, unless of course the judges are against such things) that these are not commercial caves, but wild caves.  Little ones, to be sure, but they all have signs in front of them that read (in bold): Wild Caves / Beware of Hazards / Unstable Footing / Falling Rocks / Low Ceilings / Dark Areas / Proceed with Caution Unfortunately, my camera died from lack of power to charge it up and don’t have any photographic proof.

We entered the first cave, Indian Tunnel, with a guide, one of the park rangers, and it was fairly accessible, with some stairs leading down to the bottom, and most of the roof being missing, so it wasn’t particularly dark.  Our tour ended on the cave floor, however, and naturally we were not going to be one of those families who simply took the stairs back up to the sidewalk.  No, we explored through the cave, clambered over rocks and squeezed through small openings to make our way back out and to the lava fields. After that we were on our own, and spent the next couple hours crawling, scrambling, and squeezing our way into 4 other caves, using our headlamps in the dark in cold (and sometimes snowy) hollows with ceilings too low to stand up straight.

We came back to civilization on Thursday with a drive down to Twin Falls, Idaho, some shopping, and a stop at beautiful Shoshone Falls.  When the water level is high, these falls are amazing, the “Niagara of the West”, but even low are still worth the $5 admission fee to the viewing area.   One motel night (where I don’t think any of us slept as well as we did while camping at Craters of the Moon, but at least we got to shower!) before a drive into rural Nevada (more snow-covered mountains, but we stayed a little below the snow) for a marathon on Saturday, and a chance to visit with several friends that we haven’t seen in awhile, some of them in a little more than six years.  

We’ll be driving and visiting for most of the next week, until another camping stop at a state park in Washington.  I’ll post again when we get some good pictures (and WiFi)! 

Animals of Yellowstone

We saw so many bison and elk, along with four bears, some eagles, a gorgeous yellow bird, a couple snakes, and numerous rabbits and chipmunks.  Unfortunately, it doesn't look like any of the pictures of the big animals turned out, but the little ones were pretty adorable. 

Yellowstone National Park: Firehole Falls and Gull's Point

Saturday night was even colder than Friday's snowy night was, but it was clear, so after night in the car (the rest of the campground was amused to see 3 people climb out of a Mini Cooper in the morning), we woke up to a cold but sunny morning.

After a hot breakfast, we set out for the Firehole Canyon falls on the western edge of Yellowstone, yet another beautiful photo-op in the park.  We were unable to go on the hikes we had planned, because the melting snow created a lot of mud and messy trails (not to mention the bear warnings that made some of us a bit nervous), so we spent the day driving around and seeing the animals, and finding things to do.  

Most of the snow had melted before our picnic lunch!

Gull's Point and the museum at Fishing Bridge, and it's black sand beach, were some fun places to spend some of the afternoon.  We also set up our tent again, and got ready for another chilly night.  In retrospect, we should have spent another night in the car, but I was really hoping to stretch out again.  Nothing like spending two nights in the Mini to think that sleeping in a tent in 25 degree weather would be an improvement!