Well, it only took me five months to get these pictures uploaded!!!
Dan and I took a vacation to Washington state back in August and spent many days hiking national parks and enjoying mountains. We started our trip in Seattle and arrived just in time for boat ride in the harbor.
Dowtown Seattle from the harbor
After the board ride, we headed over to Elliott's for some delicious crab!
We got an early start the next day and headed down to Pike Place Market for breakfast.
We had to stop at the original Starbucks for some coffee. At 8 a.m. the line wasn't bad, but an hour later, it was a block long.
Over at the market we saw beautiful (and cheap!) flowers and fresh seafood.
After wandering around the market for a few hours, we took the ferry over the Bainbridge Island, and had lunch and browsed some shops in historic Winslow. We got to our hotel in Olympic and mapped out our plans for the next day over pizza :)
We woke up bright and early and headed into Olympic National Park for our first day of hiking. It was a bit chilly...but as the clouds dispersed and the sun came up, the views were spectacular.
From a distance, we saw some furry mountain goats.
After several miles, we stopped for some lunch...and then turned around to head back.
Us toward the end and still standing...what was supposed to be about a 6 mile hike turned into 11...not bad for our first day.
Lake Crescent
After that, we decided to keep going and drove to a different area of the park where we walked another few miles.
The next day, we drove west and south to the Hoh Rain Forest
After the rainforest, we drove out to Ruby Beach on the Pacific Ocean.
Our afternoon ended at the Hoffstadt Bluffs Vistor Center where were took a helicopter ride over Mt. St. Helens - one of many highlights of this trip!!
There's our helicopter - ready to go
On our way to the volcano...
Mt. St. Helens - straight ahead!
Crater Lake
Amazing views of trees that were wiped out and now float in Crater Lake
Coming around the side of the volcano
Inside the crater...which was still smoking.. 34 years later.
The next day, we geared up for a 5.5 mile hike in Mt. Rainier National Park.
We saw a ton of marmots that day...friendly little guys, despite their loud, shrills.
Dan manages to make a snow angel.
Our last picture of Mt. Rainer - so beautiful!
After Mt. Rainer, we took a short hike through the Grove of the Patriarchs which has thousand-year old trees, some 30-40 inches in diameter.
That afternoon, we headed over to Snoqualmie Falls. We stayed in the Salish Lodge and great some great views of the 270 foot waterfall.
Salish Lodge
We ended our trip back in Seattle. For our last night, we met up with our college friends Jeremiah and Jenae for a seafood dinner.
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