Mount Rainier, Olympic National Park & Mount Baker

Eighteen days til I'm on my way to Washington. I've not been there in summer since 2004. The mountain you see in the photo was out the entire month of my visit. In Washington-speak, when you say the mountain is out it means the sky is clear and you can see Mount Rainier. I'm hoping the mountain is out every day of my visit again this time.

I've not hiked a mountain since 1998. I'm bringing my hiking boots with me. I hope I get to see how good a shape I'm in. Below I'll put a video of some guys climbing Mount Baker. Mount Baker is a volcano near where I lived in the Skagit Valley town of Mount Vernon. Mount Baker was about 30 miles away as a crow flies. I could see it from my kitchen window. The last time I hiked Mount Baker was with nephew Joey, sometime in the 1990s. That's Mount Baker, as seen from I-5, looking through a notch in the hills in south Mount Vernon. My nephew has a restaurant at a golf course on the other side of that notch. My house was just a bit to the left of the notch.

The hike up Mount Baker, with nephew Joey, took place from the south side. There is a big ski area on the north side of Baker. It's a much longer drive to get there, over the twisty turny Mount Baker Highway, that is not suitable for an acrophobe. The ski area of Mount Baker holds the world's record for deepest snow. My last time up there was with nephews Chris and Jeremy. They now live in Phoenix. We hiked up Tabletop Mountain where I took my all time favorite photo of the two of them sitting on top Tabletop with Mount Shuksan behind them and Mount Baker to our right. That is Jeremy in the photo on the right, sliding down Tabletop Mountain heading towards Mount Baker. That day at Tabletop Mountain was probably the most fun I ever had with my nephews. As you can see, there are a lot of mountains in Washington.

Go here for more of my photos of the Cascade Mountains and hikes I've gone on.

Below is a nice tourist type video giving you a good idea of what it's like to visit Mount Rainier and Olympic National Parks. Below that is the Mount Baker video.



The below video is of a climb up Mount Baker from the side of the mountain I hiked it with nephew Joey. The video starts in the Skagit Valley flatland.