Fall Vacation: Day 3

Mt Rainier Day:

Today we went up to Mt Rainier.  We went up through Morton to a side of the Mountain we hadn't seen before.  We planned on riding the steam train but the lines were too long.  We skipped the train but stumbled across a Mountain Climbing Festival with free activities from bouncy houses to rock climbing to browsing vendor tents.

 

I have always loved these old tree rounds.  They remind me of our relative insignificance in the world, making it that much more amazing that God knows every hair on our heads and knew us before we were born.

 If you click on the pictures it should make them big enough to read.  As far as this tree is concerned there wasn't much time between now and when Lewis and Clark were first exploring here.

A nation is born, a historically crucial date for us as Americans....

But to this tree it was a year just like any other.

Next we went through a museum that had information about the history of the area and about the plants and animals that call the area home.

The woman in the middle picture was the first woman to climb Mt Rainier.  Can you imagine climbing a mountain dressed like that?

This is a really neat old building.  Lots of history here.

These look like a bunch of happy children....

What the picture doesn't show is that daddy was behind mommy swatting at and running from an angry bee that wouldn't stop chasing him.  Look at those smiles!  We need daddy running for his life before we take all of our pictures I guess.

This neat old gas station is preserved exactly the was when it was used by Mt Rainier visitors long ago.

Unfortunately Clara fell and broke her camera while visiting the gas station. Very sad.

These were some pictures that she took before it broke that I really enjoyed so I thought I would share them.

I got so excited about the place we ate dinner that I am going to need to do a Day 3: Part II.  So for now we will call this a day.