Treehouse getaway

For Christmas, I gifted Scott an overnight stay at a nearby treehouse since he's been intrigued with treehouses and tiny homes ever since watching those types of shows on TV and YouTube. This one also happened to be right outside North Cascades National Park, which we haven't been to yet, so I thought it would be a fun little getaway. I randomly picked the first weekend of March to go and while the weather was not the best (rainy, cold, windy), it was still a fun time!

Our first stop was Rasa State Park, which is just a stone's throw from the tree house. It runs up against the Skagit River and would probably be very beautiful and fun during good weather. Unfortunately, all the hiking plans we had for the weekend were shelved because Scott happened to twist (tear?) his calf muscle while skiing on Friday so he was limping along with a walking stick. Instead of  a big hike, we just walked slowly around the trails to stretch our legs after the 2 hour drive. 

Big field of green on the campgrounds

A sandy beach!

Skagit River!

Then we headed over to the treehouse itself, which was super duper cute! We were a bit trepidacious driving up to it because the neighborhood does not look like it would have treehouses at all, but from the small parking lot, there's a little walk way that takes you into the trees. I hadn't known this when I booked but there are actually TWO treehouses and a shower house on the (very big) property, as well as a little man-made pond. I can imagine when the leaves are in, this would be a very fun place to be!

The treehouse is decorated with a camping/bear theme and was all constructed on site by the owners as a hobby project. As Evie noted, it was so inspiring! While it's very small, the room was laid out very well so we had more than enough space for the four of us. The little treehouse had a small bathroom with a flush toilet (phew!!), a full size bed, a murphy bed for the girls, a sink, microwave and small fridge. We brought with us some fixings for a charcuterie plate dinner and then settled in for the evening to watch a movie on the laptop. 

Signs pointing us towards our treehouse for the night

There's Pond Perch treehouse

Walking up the steps

Clever murphy bed behind the couch

Kitchen area, and sliding barn door hiding the bathroom

Comfy bed

Cute details on the property

Shower house

Inside the shower house

After a not-so-great sleep (the frogs are LOUD), we ate the breakfast they provided (yogurt and frozen breakfast burritos!) and then headed out to the North Cascades National Park. The drive was about an hour or so up windy roads, which made Evie carsick and I pulled over just in the nick of time for her to yak outside the car. Gross! but funny. 

The Cascades Highway (Highway 20) connects to Methow Valley (which we LOVE!) but actually closes every winter because of weather so we went as far as we could go, which was to Diablo Lake. I've been wanting to go here for a while now because it's supposedly a beautiful place with glacier fed water that gives it a stunning green color, like at Lake Louise in Banff. It's also part of a dam system and connected to Ross Lake, which is so big you can take ferry over to the Ross Lake "resort" and stay in one of their floating cabins when it's open. Unfortunately, the weather was crazy with a snow/rain mix and high winds so we never got to really see any color and hiking around was just darn cold. Add to that Scott's bum leg and we really did not get to explore too much. This just means we have an excuse to go back some other time (when the weather is better!).

A quick stop to take a pic

One of the random overlooks we stopped to take pictures at

Driving across the dam

Hiking around in the rain. We were the only ones out and about.

On the shores of Diablo Lake

We set up at the ferry dock to make lunch