A Hiking We Will Go

It's been pretty stormy this past week so I'm really glad that a few weeks back we took advantage of the good weather and did a day trip to Mt Rainier for our annual summer hike! We tried a new-to-us hike that circled Naches Peak, with a side trip to Dewey Lake. In all, it was only about ~6 miles r/t but had 1300 elevation game and with numerous stops for pictures, snacks and lunch, it was an all day affair.

All smiles at the beginning of the day, with great views of Rainier in the background.

Rainier looks so close and so far at the same time.

I wonder how much longer the kids will tolerate us taking so many photos?

Or be willing to be in selfies with me?

Family photo

That's Dewey Lake down there.

We hiked down to the lake, which was about 1.5 miles and 1200ft. It was "fun" coming back up.

Another view of Dewey Lake, on the way back up.

Fall colors were starting!

This is called no-name lake.

The trail connected with PCT for a bit!

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Happy new year!!

Goodness, it's already 2025! It's been a really long time since we posted! We had a very lazy new year. We flew back from LA on the evening of the 31st so spent the last remaining hours of 2024 cozying up on the couch and then fell asleep before it even hit midnight! On New Years day, we slept in, cleaned up the house and then did a quick hike the next day. All in all, a good start to the year! Nora's new blanket hoodie. Cold and muddy trails. We're not in LA anymore! We hiked the Primrose trail that follows Coal Creek.

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Salmon

The other weekend, Scott arranged for us to get a private tour of the Salmon hatchery on Orcas Island. It's surprising that we've been going to Orcas for over 10 years now and never noticed this place before! The tour started down by the waters along Eastsound where Mike, the facilities manager, showed us where the Salmon come in from the ocean ever year. There is a fish ladder down there and a little dock that lets them catch the spawning salmon and they can quickly fertilize the eggs. Then we drove up to the main hatchery where he walked us through where the eggs incubate until they are little hatchlings before being moved to larger swimming pools. It was an interesting little tour to learn all about the life of the salmon. This hatchery focuses on Chinook (King) salmon, and out of the 800,000 baby salmon they release back to the water, about 800-900 come back to spawn. The rest are eaten up by whales in the Pacific ocean or caught by commercial fisherman out in the open w...

Simpsons in Seattle

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