travel tangent: wa’s national parks

A tangent for anyone missing travel and adventure during the pandemic.  I’m wishing my west coast friends well as they’ve been dealing with historic high temperatures. Please let me know of any fact-checks on content below!

While living in the US, there were three national parks I didn’t have to travel far to for spectacular vistas—Mount Rainier, North Cascades, and Olympic.  When I lived in the Seattle area for a year 2000-2001, I had a taste of both Mount Rainier and Olympic and, after I returned in 2006 for a longer stay, all three parks became a frequent destination for my outdoor adventures.

Mount Rainier National Park (established 1899)

When you’re driving around Seattle and your jaw drops when you see a huge solo snow-covered mountain, that’s Rainier. 

The Cascade Range runs from southern British Columbia, through Washington and Oregon, to Northern California.  Mount Rainier, at 14,410 feet, is the range’s highest peak.  The national park is less than a two-hour drive from Seattle making it a typical place to impress out-of-town guests and leading to packed visitor centers, especially on the weekends.  In the 12 years I lived in the PNW, Rainier’s size and beauty never failed to surprise me. 

The park is on traditional lands of indigenous peoples that include the Cowlitz, Muckleshoot, Nisqually, Puyallup, Squaxin Island, and Yakama peoples.  Mount Rainier is an active volcano that last erupted in 1895.  Driving near the park and seeing the Volcano Evacuation Route signs on the highways always gave me pause—I’m old enough to remember when Rainier’s nearby neighbour to the southwest, Mount St. Helens, erupted in 1980.

I hiked and snowshoed in the park over the years but my strongest memories are of treks up to Camp Muir (10,180ft), Rainier’s base camp for climbers.  That’s the highest elevation I’ve ever been.  The trek (some combination of hiking, scrambling, and snowshoeing depending on the amount of snow) started at Paradise (5400ft) and gained 4780 feet over 4 miles (the 4 miles return was a different challenge).  After assembling ourselves in the busy parking lot, we would gradually leave the kids playing in the snow behind, pass the day-hikers going to Panorama Point, and join the lines of serious folk following the flags up the Muir Snowfield. 

I did the trek multiple times in spring 2011 and 2012 while training to climb Mount Rainier as a fund-raising initiative for the Washington’s National Park Fund.  On my summit attempt in 2012 (we were weathered off), I slept one night at Muir in a large hut with bunks of snoring men and the second night in a tent on the snow.  But my most memorable trip to Camp Muir was actually my first time there because a thunderstorm moved in quickly while we were descending.  Being above the tree line with the threat of lightening is a dangerous place so my small group ran down the mountain (in snowshoes) regularly throwing ourselves in the snow at the leader’s cry. 

When MAC and I went to the park in May 2015 for her first visit, I was shocked by the lack of snow at Paradise—that winter had set a record low snowfall at only 266 inches (for comparison, snowfall was 907 inches in winter 2010-2011 and 698 inches in winter 2011-2012 when I was doing my treks to Camp Muir).  The lot at Paradise was so packed that we ended up parking far away in an area I had never been before and I was rewarded with a view of Rainier I had never seen before.  That trip, MAC and I hiked to the impressive Comet Falls (320ft drop) and, knowing I was moving back to Nova Scotia in two years, I was glad I got to explore a part of the park that was new to me. 

Mount Rainier has the most glaciers (25!) on a single peak in the contiguous US and is the origin of five major rivers.  Paradise, on the southern side, open year-round with the main visitor center and historic Paradise Inn, is the busiest spot in the park.  I also recommend Sunrise, in the northeast corner and at the highest elevation you can drive to (6400ft), which provides great views including of the Emmons Glacier, Rainier’s largest glacier.

The subalpine wildflower meadows in the park are under snow except for a brief summer period.  These fragile meadows are under restoration (can you believe there used to be a golf course at Paradise!) and are always under threat from off-trail foot traffic.  I had planned to visit at peak wildflower time—late July/early August depending on snow melt—but never got there.  Also on my list of what I missed is to backpack part of the Wonderland Trail, a 93-mile (150km) hiking trail all around the mountain. 

North Cascades National Park (established 1968)

If you’re looking north from Seattle and spot mountains, you’re seeing the North Cascade Range.

North Cascades National Park, on the traditional lands of the Skagit peoples, is a wonderfully wild and undeveloped area.  It’s only about a two-hour drive from Seattle to the park boundary, but likely at least a three-hour drive to get wherever you’re going.  I did more day hikes near the park than actually in the park.  The park boasts a huge diversity in flora.  The highest peak in the park is Goode Mountain at 9220 feet and the range has more than 300 glaciers.  All drive-to campsite and accommodations are outside the park boundaries as there is only backcountry camping in the park proper.  With few people to share the trails or nearby campgrounds with, it feels remote. 

In 2012, I shared a sunny August weekend there with some of my women hiking buddies.  The undeveloped description of the park also applies to nearby accommodations and restaurants and there were not many choices for a vegetarian at that time.  I had previously camped at the lovely state-run Newhalem Campground but that weekend four of us opted to share a rustic cabin near Marblemount.  We had been warned not to expect a Holiday Inn Express and so were all able to laugh at the wobbly toilet seat and dodgy shower (my online research shows it as now under new ownership and renovations).  And even when there are few choices for restaurants, small towns in WA are usually good for a drive-thru espresso hut (Marblemount is no exception)—it must be the influence of Starbucks which opened its first cafe in Seattle in 1971.

I remember arriving at the Cascade Pass parking lot in my 1995 Jeep Wrangler and thinking the over-the-top view from there would have been worth the long drive alone.  But that was just where we laced up our boots to hike the Cascade Pass / Sahale Arm Trails with wide open views of glacier-capped mountains.  The next day we did another sweaty hike on the Thornton Lake Trail and scrambled up to Trappers Peak for views of the mountain range and lakes below. 

Olympic National Park (established 1938)

If you’re looking west from Seattle towards the Pacific Ocean and see mountains, you’re looking at the Olympic Range. 

The Olympic Mountains are a range on the Olympic Peninsula west of Seattle.  They are lower than the Cascade Range but still glacier-covered.  Their highest point is Mount Olympus at 7962 feet. 

Olympic National Park, about a 2.5 hour drive from the city (more or less depending if you take a ferry), is the park with the mostest: a snow-capped mountain range, the only rain forests in the contiguous US, and remote Pacific beaches.  The park is on traditional lands of indigenous peoples that include the Hoh, Klallam, Makah, Quileute, Quinault, and Skokomish peoples.

My many trips there were more about relaxation than strenuous hiking and catching the ferry was always part of the adventure.  In 2009, I visited the town of Forks for the first time knowing nothing about Twilight.  There were Twilight shops and Twilight tours.  What is Twilight?  A series of YA books set around Forks because it is supposedly the place in the US that receives the least amount of sunlight and the books are about … vampires.

The park’s visitor center at Hurricane Ridge (5242 ft) provides a spectacular close-up view of the Olympic Range but my happy place was being at sea level with my feet in the sand and surf.  The 70 miles of isolated coastline provide plenty of beaches with sea stacks and anemone-filled tide pools to explore.  Like the North Cascades, Olympic is also home to a great diversity in plant species.

When MAC visited me in October 2016, we did a first-visit-for-her and last-visit-for-me trip to Olympic National Park.  Staying at the park’s Kalaloch Lodge right on the Pacific coast, we welcomed being offline (there was no wifi or cellular there).  We timed our visit to nearby Ruby Beach with the sunset—the number of photographers (including MAC) made the beach almost feel busy. 

Visitors to Seattle area can easily check off three on their national parks wish list.  I fell in love with all of the parks while I was there and visited many times but there is still so much that was left undone.  For very different reasons, the parks all added magic to my time living there. For me, Mount Rainier was about the pride of the inner little girl from the Atlantic coast getting herself up to the climber’s base camp multiple times.  The North Cascades were about where to go to truly feel like I was in the wilderness.  And Olympic National Park was about touching something ancient while standing on those remote Pacific beaches. 

References and related links:

• PNW: Pacific Northwest.
• MAC: mon amie Caroline.
• YA: Young Adult genre of novels.
• coldish (post #84)
• Mount Rainier National Park (NPS site)
• North Cascades National Park (NPS site)
• Olympic National Park (NPS site)