our last stop on our tour of pacific northwest national parks and big cities was mount rainier. after our time in monroe and visiting seattle, we made our way south to packwood, washington, which is just outside of the national park. as we were settling in, i noticed that i had a slight tickle in […]
hiking
sauk mountain & north cascades day two.

on our second day at north cascades, we knew we wanted to find a fantastic hike. derek researched for awhile and we settled on a hike that isn’t actually in the park, but just outside in the national forest, on sauk mountain. the road to the trailhead was very rustic. bumpy, winding, internetless. as we […]
north cascades national park. day one.

after our time in sequim with jenn and brandy, we had a LONG drive around the puget sound and then back up to north cascades national park. this would be our first stop on a whirlwind week at north cascades, exploring seattle and then moving down to mount rainier (which is where i am typing […]
sol duc and marymere falls.olympic national park.

on our first (and bonus day) on the north side of olympic national park, the weather was overcast and rainy, so we decided it would be a good day to find a rainforesty type of hike. there’s several actual rainforests in olympic, but the sol duc area is sort of on the edge of hoh […]
travel day detour to cape flattery.

when we left quileute (and it’s proximity to the closed down hoh rainforest) and traveled to a walmart in port angeles near our next campsite, our route took us around the northwest corner of the olympic peninsula. and since derek had to work anyways, we decided it was a good time to make a detour […]
hole-in-the-wall, rialto beach.olympic national park.

as soon as we moved from ocean city to our campground on the quileute reservation in la push, washington, we bundled up and loaded the kids in the car for a hike at rialto beach, which is part of olympic national park. our main motivation for rushing to this hike as soon as we arrived […]
the amazing oregon coast, continued.

when we woke up in brookings to beautiful weather and changed our travel plans to move up the coast versus heading inland, i decided to have an extrended travel day, stopping often to enjoy the beaches, scenery and some historic lighthouses. since isaac has not interest in such things, he rode with derek, and the […]
from california to oregon and happenings therein.

well, when i last posted, we were in the redwoods area of way northern california. from there, we moved up the coast a bit, crossing into oregon for a week on the coast. originally, we had planned a bit more time in another part of the redwoods, but we were worried about the internet, so […]
non-quest related redwood adventures.

for my third and final post from our spot just south of the redwood national and state parks, i’ll tell you about the cool things we did in the area that didn’t earn us a patch or badge. the first thing that we did was head to the visitor center, which is right on the […]
redwoods edventure quests.trillium falls, patrick’s point, prairie creek.

WARNING. this post contains one zillion pictures of redwood trees, the ocean, and lidkids. as we normally do at any national park, we first stopped at the visitor center to get junior ranger books, advice and the lay of the land. redwood national and state parks is different from most national parks because, as the […]