From and Dark and Dank Entrance to a Bright and Beautiful Exit.

Our destination was Mt. Rainier National Park as we left Chehalis. The forecast was for partly cloudy with clearing later in the day. we thought we should try it. We arrived at the last place open in the park, called Paradise and it was semi clear. We went to the information film and had lunch. When we came out it had fogged up so much we could hardly see more than 200 feet. Never the less it was a beautiful day after we decended a couple hundred feet. We took 115 pictures today so it is hard to select.

Not a sign you see every day!!

As I said yesterday, logging is big here. This is one of many piles of logs.

Think the structure will hold up this sign?

This is the West Entrance to the park

The lower levels of the park are dark and damp with moss everywhere. It's a little creepy.

This "slice" of a fir tree was cut in 1963. The squares tell of world events during this trees life. The center square is dated 1295 AD!!

E pluribus unum

Wait ! I have one more, but I am saving it till the end

This is the upper Nisqually River Valley. The melting snow and ice relocate every spring and bring forest debris and rocks into this riverbed. The Nisqually Glacier is a part of Mt. Rainier

This is looking further down the same river valley as it grows from incoming streams

This is the best shot I could get of the Mountain. This was as we decended and some clearing had occured, but the peak is still not visible.

This was at Paradise as we came out from lunch. It was a Twilight Zone moment!

Now a series of Mountain pictures, but be sure to see the finale!

Nice view

The road is in view

Snow increased as we went up

Coming down we could see more mountains in the distance

Tired of mountains yet?

This is actually east of the park, probably some of the most dramatic scenery

We are almost down to Yakima level

This road was not open till recently. Hang on the best picture (without Barb in it) is still to come.

Along the valley floor going into Yakima the landscape was very unusual

Apples are a huge crop in the valleys we went through in Washington. These are the large crates we often see at our orchards that are about 4x3x3. We saw hundreds of these piled up waiting for picking season.

If you made it this far, I think this was the most beautiful shot of the day.The falls are at least 100 feet tall, and we could not see the bottom.