First Day Of October Virtually Hiking Washington's Mount Rainier

This first morning of the new month, flipping the month to October, I saw the scene on my American Scenic Wonders wall calendar is a scenic wonder in my old home state of Washington, that, if I remember correctly, I only saw twice, up close, as in the National Park, all my years of living in Washington.

The second time I visited this scenic wonder was August 11, 2008, with my favorite sister-in-law and her mom. This was the first time I actually did some hiking in Mount Rainier National Park, hiking from the area known as Paradise, up the lower slops of the Rainier volcano.

It being August, Mount Rainier National Park, that day in 2008 was overcrowded with tourists. I recollect finding a parking spot at Paradise was a bit challenging.

Long ago, on one of my other blogs, I blogged about Mount Rainier. I do not recollect if that blogging has photos of that day in August, back in 2008. Just a sec, and I shall go see.

Yes, there is a photo or two from that day way back almost two decades ago, and a video.

The reason I seldom visited Mount Rainier whilst living in Washington was the fact that the mountain was around 130 miles south of my Skagit Valley location.

I was much closer to another volcano, Mount Baker, to go hiking on, and the equally close North Cascades National Park hiking trails, which actually are much more scenic than Mount Rainier, in that the sea of mountains one sees when one is in the heart of the North Cascades is much more of a broadly spanning multi-mountain scene than that one giant Rainier volcano dominating all its surrounding area.

Sometimes I find myself wondering if I will ever again see my feet hiking on a real mountain trail. My nearest current such opportunity is about 50 miles north, in Oklahoma via the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge. I suspect it likely that the Wichita Mountains will not quite be the same as the Cascade Mountains of Washington, and Oregon...

Remembering Mount Rainier Hiking With David, Theo & Ruby's Grandma

What you see here is not one of my instances of a photo of Mount Rainier which has been telephotoed to look closer and bigger than it actually is.

What you see here is a photo of Mount Rainier as it looks when you are in Mount Rainier National Park on a hiking trail which leads to the base of the volcano.

That would be, standing next to me, in front of Mount Rainier, the Tacoma Trio of David, Theo and Ruby's, Grandma Janet, the mama of Mama Kristin.

Microsoft OneDrive Memories of this Day think this memory happened within the past five years, on this date in August.

But, I know exactly when this particular memory happened. August 11, 2008. On that date I drove Kristin, Janet and myself to Mount Rainier.

Ironically, this was only the second time I was in Mount Rainier National Park. All my years living in Washington I only visited that mountain, up close, once.

Where I lived in Washington, Mount Rainier was about 100 miles to the south. If I wanted to go hiking in the Cascade Mountains I had way closer venues. That and Mount Rainier National Park is super crowded with tourists, whilst there are many areas, equally scenic, where that is not the case.

Where I lived in Washington there were two volcanoes way closer than Mount Rainier. Those being Mount Baker and Glacier Peak.

Glacier Peak is the most illusive of the Washington volcanoes. You do not see Glacier Peak from the Western Washington lowlands. You have to drive up into the mountains to see Glacier Peak.

I only hiked to the base of Glacier Peak once. It was an almost 20-mile roundtrip hike. The route to the volcano takes you past Kennedy Hot Springs. I remember misjudging the timing of the hike, which had the final couple miles in scary darkness, using a flashlight to keep the trail visible.

I wonder how well I would handle a 20-mile hike nowadays. I suspect such would be a bit of a challenge...

Closeup Mount Rainier Look From Texas By Chris & Sheila

If I remember correctly, and sometimes I do, a time or two or three, previously, I have made mention of the fact, with photo documentation, that I find some photos of Washington's Mount Rainier volcano to be a bit misrepresentative.

As in photos zoomed in on the Mountain, making the volcano look like it was bigger and way closer to Seattle than it actually looks in real life, in person.

Now, that photo of Mount Rainier you see here is not representative of those exaggerated Mount Rainier photos.

This photo of Mount Rainier was taken yesterday from the backyard viewing venue of two of my favorite Washingtonians, the young ladies known as Chris and Sheila.

Up til fairly recently Chris and Sheila's view of Mount Rainier was from their location a few miles south and east of Seattle, in the Kent highlands. The Mountain was not viewable from their then home, but came into view when leaving their home zone and driving towards Lake Meridian.

The Misses Chris and Sheila have relocated from Kent, to a new home in Lacey, a suburb of Olympia, much closer to Mount Rainier.

I do not know if the new Chris and Sheila location is in the Mount Rainier Eruption Evacuation Route area, such as I know exists a few miles to the east. I have seen the Volcano Evacuation Route signs between Puyallup and Tacoma.

What I do know for certain is there are no Volcano Evacuation Route signs anywhere within many many miles of my current Texas location...

Fort Worth Is Not One Of America's Nature Lovers Cities

I saw that which you see here via a Microsoft New photo gallery of the 15 Best American Cities For Nature Lovers.

I do not know if the link will work in all browsers.

Most of the towns on the list were the usual nature suspects, Denver, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Santa Fe and Seattle.

Some of the towns on this list just seemed odd, nature lover-wise. Indianapolis, Columbus, Cleveland, Boston and Atlanta.

How are both of America's Portlands not on this list, particularly the Portland in Oregon?

And, no nature loving towns in Texas? Shocking. Not even Fort Worth, with its nature loving inner tube floating in the polluted Trinity River? 

This nature loving article's description of Seattle seemed totally accurate to me...

In Seattle you’ll already feel like you’re in nature, even in the midst of skyscrapers. But despite the natural surroundings, including forests, water and mountains, there’s still a distinctly urban feel to the city with its innovative tech scene, a walkable waterfront full of shops and restaurants, and plenty of attractions. One highlight is the Seattle Center, where you’ll find the distinctive Space Needle and Museum of Pop Culture.

I wonder if Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision ever becomes something one can see, if upbeat verbiage might result about that sad sack of a town's imaginary waterfront, verbiage of the sort used to describe Seattle.

But, other than all that, what actually struck my eye about this Nature Loving Cities article was the photo of the Seattle skyline.

A time of two I have opined that I am not a fan of the distorted, zoomed photos of Seattle, showing Mount Rainier looking way closer and bigger than it actually is, sort of misrepresenting the view tourists might see if a cloud-free sky allowed such, as in, a view of Mount Rainier in the distance.

This photo, the one you see above, that photo actually looks like what Mount Rainier actually looks like, from Seattle.

Still totally impressive, and the likes of nothing I see on the horizon at my current Texas location...

Microsoft OneDrive Remembering Nephew Jeremy Driving & Mount Rainier

The memory photos from today's Microsoft OneDrive Memories from this Day could have been from August of 2017.

I'd flown to Washington early in August of that year, which would make the next photo one I took of Mount Rainier whilst flying over that currently dormant volcano.

In that first photo memory that is my Favorite Nephew Jeremy, driving. That August of 2017, I spent a week in Washington, and then flew to Arizona for a week with my mom.

On Mondays, like clockwork, Jeremy would show up at my mom's to take mom on their weekly dinner date to one of the many fast-food joints in Chandler, Arizona.

I suspect that that is what is happening in the Jeremy driving photo, driving mom and me to the weekly fast-food dinner.

Jeremy, like his mother, is a good driver. There are some people whose driving always makes me nervous. Jeremy and his mom are among those who do not make me nervous when they are behind a vehicular wheel.

Another example of this some people's driving making me nervous thing is the Goober Twins. One of the Goober Twins, Wally, has never made me nervous when he is behind the wheel, whilst his twin, Big Ed, tends to make anyone riding, with him driving, to be nervous.

I remember a roadtrip, back in the early 1990s. We'd rented a Cadillac to drive to Reno and Yosemite, and points in between. In the Cadillac were the Goober Twins, me and a guy named Dale.

Wally did all the driving til we got to Yosemite.

I had no problem with Wally's driving, none at all. However, when it came time to leave Yosemite, Dale took me aside and sort of begged me to take over the driving due to, apparently, Wally's driving making Dale nervous. Wally is a bit of a speeder.

The Cadillac had an onboard computer calculating gas mileage. Soon after me taking over the driving, due to usually driving below the speed limit, the gas mileage quickly improved, soon getting over 20 miles to the gallon in that big gas guzzling Cadillac...

In Seattle Looking Too Close To Mount Rainier

If I remember correctly, and sometimes I do, I have previously made mention of the fact that I find the frequent instances of misleading photos of Mount Rainier to be a bit worrisome.

What with tourists arriving in Washington expecting to see Mount Rainier being a gigantic presence looming nearby.

This morning's Seattle Times online had the best example yet of this. The Seattle Space Needle peeking above Queen Anne Hill, with Mount Rainier looking like a nearby monster.

Now, when the Mountain is out, it is an impressive sight, naturally, as seen via one's eyes. When one is in Tacoma the Mountain looms way larger, and closer, than it does in Seattle. But not nearly like that which you see in the above photo.

On a clear day, from the vantage point of the Skagit Flats, a little over 100 miles north of Mount Rainier, one can see the Mountain, looking like a big white pimple on the horizon.

I know a lifelong Texan, here in Wichita Falls, who had never been to the west coast til a couple years ago when she flew to Seattle to visit some friends. She'd never seen mountains before. She told me it was mesmerizing, no matter which way she looked, west, east, north or south, she saw mountains. 

I do not know if she had a pre-conceived notion about how large Mount Rainier loomed on the skyline. But, I do know that her friends had a cabin near Enumclaw, the town thought of as the Gateway to Mount Rainier, and that she was overwhelmed looking at that Mountain, so big and white, so close.

She did not know, til I told her, that there are four more volcanoes in Washington. She knew of Mount St. Helens, but not the other three.

Mount Baker, the volcano I lived near when I lived in the Skagit Valley, also gets the distorted zoomed photo treatment. Mount Baker, like Rainier, is also totally impressive in its natural state, without any photo enhancement.

It has been years since I have seen a real mountain, other than the artificial mountain, Mount Wichita, that is located in the town in which I currently reside...

Tourists Looking For Washington's Mount Rainier & Mount Wichita In Texas

Saw the photo you see here, this Monday morning, on Facebook. The mountain hovering over the scene is the volcano known as Mount Rainier. Or just, The Mountain, if you live in Western Washington.

Used in a sentence, "The Mountain is out today".  Meaning the sky is clear of clouds and you can see Mount Rainier.

The ferry, with ferry floaters crowded on the outdoor viewing deck, is in Elliot Bay, heading to dock at Seattle's Coleman Ferry Dock.

When I see photos of Mount Rainier, like this one, a telephoto zoomed in look at The Mountain, I always think it a tad unfair to those who do not live in Western Washington, who come to visit, expecting The Mountain to look like it looks in this photo.

Even when not telephotoed and zoomed in, The Mountain is still a spectacular site.

Seeing The Mountain when you are in Tacoma you are way closer to the volcano and it looks way bigger than it looks from Seattle.

Way back in the last decade of the previous century, I was with nephews Jason and Joey on a cloudy, rainy day, on a ferry heading from Seattle to Bainbridge Island.

A couple tourists asked us if we were locals. Yes, we replied. 

Could you point out to us where we would see Mount Rainier if the sky was clear? All three of us, me, Jason and Joey, pointed in the same direction, knowing intuitively where The Mountain was.

At my current Wichita Falls, Texas location it would be a bit of a surprise for a tourist to ask me if I was a local and which direction the mountain was.

Since there is only one mountain within many many miles, I guess I would point in the direction of Mount Wichita, and hope the tourists are not too disappointed if they make their way to the base of Mount Wichita and make the climb to the summit for the not too scenic look at the surrounding landscape....

Looking At The Twin Tacoma Narrows Bridges & Mount Rainier

What you see here is known as the Tacoma Narrows Bridges. Twin suspension bridges connecting Tacoma to the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington.

That mountain in the background is the volcano named Mount Rainier.

I was in Tacoma several times earlier this century, during the construction of the new bridge, that being the one on the right.

That bridge was clearly built over water, really deep, fast moving water, when the tide changes.

I was seeing this bridge get built over water at the same time I was seeing the Texas town called Fort Worth struggle to try and build three simple little freeway overpass type bridges, over dry land, to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

Those responsible for building those Fort Worth bridges repeatedly told the gullible Fort Worth public that these three bridges were being built over dry land, to save money, when there was no other option than to build the bridges over dry land, with one day, hopefully, a cement-lined ditch to be dug under the bridges, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch, thus creating the imaginary island.

Apparently, Fort Worth's plan to create that imaginary island has run into an engineering snafu regarding the design of the mechanism which would divert river water into that cement-lined ditch.

Back to the Tacoma Narrows bridges. Aesthetically speaking, methinks it would have been visually more appealing if the new bridge looked exactly like the older bridge. But, it is wider. And the towers that support the suspension cables were made to somewhat look like the other bridge's towers, but, for some reason they were not painted green, which would have been so much more aesthetically pleasing.

It has been a few years since I have been in Tacoma and seen the Tacoma Narrows bridges. Maybe those gray towers of the new bridge have now been colored to match the original bridge...

The Tacoma Narrows Bridge & Mount Rainier & The Imaginary Panther Island

I saw that which you see here on Facebook, yesterday. The Tacoma Narrows Bridges, with Mount Rainier hovering on the horizon.

Unlike those zoomed photos of the Seattle skyline which make it look like Mount Rainier is way closer than it really is, this Tacoma photo of Mount Rainier is pretty much how it actually looks.

When you drive around Tacoma it can seem like the mountain is moving. It's a weird optical illusion. 

I was in Tacoma several times during the construction period of the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge. That would be the span on the right, with more lanes than the original bridge.

I realize it would have been difficult to make the new bridge look just like the much older, original bridge. There seems to have been some attempt to do so, but can't the towers be painted green to match the other bridge?

It was interesting to me to get to see this bridge under construction. Built over deep, fast moving saltwater.

During the same time frame, I marveled at the bizarre spectacle of Fort Worth, Texas struggling for seven years to build three simple little freeway overpass looking bridges, known as the Panther Island Bridges, over dry land, to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island, with the hope that one day a cement lined ditch will be dug under the three bridges, with Trinity River water diverted into the ditch, creating the imaginary island.

The Tacoma Narrows Bridge does not cross from Tacoma to an island. It crosses over the Narrows to the Olympic Peninsula....

Lovely Linda Lou Takes Us To Daffodils & Mount Rainier

 A couple days ago I posted a blog post titled Seeing Real Islands From Summit Of Washington's Mount Erie in which I made mention of the fact that a time or two I had been surprised to see Mount Rainier, to the south, from the Skagit Flats.

And then yesterday, the Skagit Valley's lovely Linda Lou, text messaged me the photo you see above.

The Skagit Flats ablaze with the yellow of thousands of daffodils, with the Mount Rainier volcano hovering in the distance.

I surely do miss living in a zone of multiple scenic wonders...

Microsoft Memory Of Mount Rainier From Kent

The photo you see here showed up this second Saturday of the second month of 2024, in my email, a Microsoft OneDrive Memory from this Day, that I do remember, but it certainly was not on this day.

This photo was taken way back in October of 2005. Flying out of D/FW I found myself seated next to a mom and her three kids who were refugees from New Orleans, stuck in D/FW after escaping the Katrina Hurricane, they were heading to Washington to stay with relatives in Bremerton.

The flight that time routed through Las Vegas, switching to another plane to continue on to Seattle. I'd been in the Las Vegas airport a time or two. The Katrina mom was a bit frazzled so I offered to help her navigate to the next plane. 

It was well after midnight we landed at Sea-Tac. A ghostly empty airport. The person who was supposed to pick me up, was not there. I called her to learn she'd left for the airport a few minutes prior. She was coming from Tacoma. So, I knew I had about a half hour wait. 

I soon came upon the mom and her three kids, also waiting. Their relative was not there, either. I told her I would have a car in about an hour and could come pick them up and deliver them to Bremerton, if need be. Gave her my cell number. I never heard from her again. I assume they made it to Bremerton.

The photo above was taken after my sister called me as she was driving to work to tell me The Mountain was out and looking good. I was at my sister's in Kent, that is a suburb of Seattle, between Seattle and Tacoma.

After getting the call about The Mountain being out, I grabbed my camcorder and headed down the hill a short distance to Lake Meridian, which is the lake you see in the photo, with Mount Rainier looming large.

The photo is a screenshot from the video I took of the walk down the hill to see The Mountain.

Of late I am starting to wonder if I am ever going to see a real mountain again...

Nephew Jason Takes Us To A Sunset Look At Mount Baker Whilst Miss Sheila Takes Us To A Mount Rainier Sunrise

Incoming email this morning from my Favorite Jason Nephew, with one photo, and the following text...

We are thawing up north, very slowly.

My phone indicates that you are freezing some thousand miles to the south and east.

Took this picture on my way home from work tonight of Mount Baker via the same viewpoint of a few days earlier.  Sunset is gradually working back to the 5 p.m. hour.

It was certainly more beautiful in person.

I wish you were here to enjoy the great Pacific Northwest.

__________________

I also wish I was enjoying the great Pacific Northwest. No matter which direction I look at my current Texas location I see no scenery like that which you see above.

And then there was this, from renowned Pacific Northwest photographer, Sheila K, a sunrise look at Mount Rainier from her Lacey backyard.

I do not know how close, miles wise, Miss Sheila and Miss Chris are from Mount Rainier, at their Lacey location. Lacey is a town a few miles east of Olympia.

If Mount Rainier ever decides to go into active volcano mode, Sheila and Chris will have an interesting phenomenon to pay close attention to...

Mountain Rainier Looming Large Over The Skagit Flats

I saw that which you see here, on Facebook, a look at Mount Rainier from the Skagit Flats. The Mountain is about 100 miles south of the Skagit Flats.

I have seen Mount Rainier from the Skagit Flats, on a clear, smog-free day. The view you see here makes Mount Rainier look like it looms large, above the Skagit Flats.

That is due to this being a zoomed view of Mount Rainier. In reality, to the naked eye, from the Skagit Flats Mount Rainier is just a small bump on the horizon.

So many photos of Mount Rainier do that camera zoom thing, making The Mountain look bigger and closer. Thus when tourists visit Washington for the first time expecting to see Mount Rainier looming large, like it is hovering over Seattle and Tacoma, when it really does not look like that.

Even so, it is still a rather cool thing to see whilst on the Skagit Flats, looking south to the Mount Rainier volcano, looking east at the Mount Baker volcano, which is way closer than Mount Rainier.

I have not seen a real mountain this decade, not since I was in Arizona in 2019 have I seen a mountain...

Mount Rainier Is Back Fully Clothed In White

Saw that which you see here, via Miss Chris, on Facebook.

At the Chris and Sheila vantage point at their previous home in Kent, a suburb south of Seattle, they had no direct view of The Mountain, also known as Mount Rainier.

At the new Knappson location, a smart home they built in Lacey, a suburb of Olympia, Chris and Sheila have a direct look at The Mountain.

Just a short time ago The Mountain had lost most of its white covering. Glaciers were melting away.

The Mountain looked naked.

But now, in mid-December, The Mountain is back being totally covered in white, thanks to a couple Atmospheric Rivers dumping a lot of water on Western Washington, which arrives in frozen form at the higher elevations.

At my current location we do not get any precipitation from Atmospheric Rivers. However, rain is in the forecast for later today.

But there are no higher elevations for hundreds of miles, which would get snow covered by incoming rain...

Zoomed Look At Mount Rainier From Texas

I saw that which you see here, this morning, on Facebook.

Anyone who has been to Seattle on a clear sky day knows that this is not what the view of Mount Rainier actually looks like from a Seattle vantage point.

Seeing this reminded me of something from way back on April 5, 1984. Well, it may have been April 6.

The reason I can sort of pinpoint the date is because on April 5 or 6 I was riding a ferry from Seattle to Bainbridge Island, with nephews Jason and Joey.

When we got onboard the ferry and made our way to the upper deck we saw a newspaper stand with a Seattle Times sporting a big headline, reporting the news that Kurt Cobain had committed suicide. I do not remember the exact headline.

What I do remember is nephew Joey being upset at this news, asking me why would Kurt Cobain do such a thing. 

A cousin of Jason and Joey's mother was Kurt Cobain's teacher in grade school, in, I think, Montesano.

Strange coincidence, way back on August 16, 1977, I was on another ferry, heading to Friday Harbor in the San Juan Islands, with Jason and Joey's dad, my little brother Jake. We were barely onboard when we heard on the radio and saw a newspaper headline announcing that Elvis Presley had died.

Back to the subject of seeing the Mountain. That ferry boat ride to Bainbridge Island was on a cloudy, foggy, rainy day. A few minutes after leaving Seattle a couple engaged us in conversation. Asking if we were tourists or natives. We live here, said we, in a valley about 60 miles north.

The couple then told us they were first time visitors to Washington and Seattle. The husband of the couple asked if we could point to where Mount Rainier would be seen if it was a clear day. All three of us pointed in the Mount Rainier direction.

So, that photo at the top, and others like that, cause me to wonder how many first-time visitors to Washington arrive thinking if the sky is clear that Mount Rainier is going to look as big as it does in photos which have taken a zoomed view.

I doubt many are disappointed. The real view is still extremely impressive. I remember a Wichita Falls local, having visited Washington for the first time, found seeing all the mountains to be mesmerizing, especially when she was taken by the friends she was visiting in Seattle, to their cabin near Mount Rainer. 

I can see how if one had lived in a flat place like most of Texas, that being in a mountainous zone might be a bit overwhelming.

Neither The Mountain Or Space Needle Is Out At My Texas Location

Saw that which you see here, this November 16 afternoon, on Facebook, with the verbiage in the posting saying, "Mountain was out...11/14/23".

In Western Washington Mount Rainier is usually referred to as The Mountain. If you say something like "The Mountain is out, clear and bright today", one knows it is Mount Rainier being referred to, even though Washington has many big mountains, five of which, including Rainier, are volcanoes.

But, what I was most interested in in the photo was the Space Needle. What is going on on top of the Space Needle?

Is a new observation deck being added to the top of the Needle? It costs over 20 bucks to ride the elevator to the top of the Needle. Is there going to be an option to pay a few more bucks to get to climb a ladder totally to the top of the Needle?

I think I would pass on that option.

Fun fact. If you are ever in Seattle and an earthquake is pending, the safest place to be in Seattle is at the top of the Space Needle. The Needle will sway in the quake, in a big one the swaying would be carnival ride worthy. But it will not topple.

The bulk of the weight of the Space Needle structure is a HUGE base of concrete, to which the Needle's steel legs are solidly bonded. 

Supposedly the transit tunnels which go under downtown Seattle are also designed to survive a strong earthquake. I think I'd rather be at the top of the Needle, than underground, if that ground starts quaking...

Bomb Cyclone Covers Mount Rainier In White

 A few days ago, Washington's Miss Chris took us to a bare Mount Rainier.

This Sunday morning, of the first day of the 2023 version of October, Miss Chris, on Facebook, took us back to Mount Rainer, showing us that The Mountain is back fully clothed.

I knew this past week my old home zone had been hit with what is now known as a Bomb Cyclone. When I lived in Washington a Bomb Cyclone was known as a Pineapple Express.

The Bomb Cyclone dropped a lot of water on the lowlands of Washington, and, apparently, a lot of snow at the higher elevations.

Washington's Miss Chris Takes Us Again To Bare Mount Rainier

Saw that which you see here on Facebook this morning, via Washington's Miss Chris.

Miss Chris, Sheila and Macie live in Lacey, a town a few miles east of Olympia, and closer to Mount Rainier than their former location in the Seattle suburb of Kent.

I have never seen Mount Rainier this bare of white ice, known as glaciers. Mount Rainier usually sports multiple glaciers.

I have not seen a recent photo of the Washington volcano I used to live near, Mount Baker.

I suspect Mount Baker is less white than Mount Rainier, due to Mount Baker, at 10,786 feet above sea level being quite a bit shorter than Mount Rainier's 14,411 elevation.

Spending the majority of my existence on the planet living near sea level in Western Washington, with mountains any direction one looked, those mountains look so tall.

My first time seeing the Rocky Mountains in Colorado I was non-plussed, because they did not look as big as mountains I was used to seeing in Washington.  And then I realized the base level of the Rocky Mountains is way above sea level. As in Denver is a mile high, so, naturally the Rocky Mountains do not look as high as they would if Denver were at sea level.

There are mountains in the Colorado Rocky Mountains that one can drive to the top of, such as Pikes Peak, at 14,115 feet above sea level, almost as tall as Mount Rainier.

There are no mountains in the Cascade or Olympic Mountain ranges that one can drive to the top of.

I miss mountains...

Microsoft Remembering Me Hiking To Mount Rainier

Yesterday, September 11, Microsoft's OneDrive email, with supposed memories from that day, managed, once again, to come up with memories which I, once again, actually remember.

Which is easy since these memories are all of the same thing.

Mount Rainier.

However, Microsoft is off by a month. It was on August 11, 2008, that these Mount Rainier memories were made, not September 11.

On that August day, way back then, I drove my sister-in-law, Kristin, and her mom, Janet, to Mount Rainier.

It was a busy day at Mount Rainier. Lots of tourists. We eventually found a place to park at Paradise and proceeded to hike towards the Mountain, eventually reaching the Myrtle Creek waterfall.

I'd been to Mount Rainier several times, but this was the first time I have been in the National Park with a clear enough sky so that the Mountain was actually out and easily seen, though it got cloud covered and uncovered several times as we hiked towards it.

Mount Rainier is sort of like San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. It took a couple visits to San Francisco before I saw the Golden Gate Bridge not shrouded in thick fog.

Microsoft's OneDrive repeated one of the memories, twice. I don't know why they would do this, as there were dozens upon dozens of Mount Rainier memories to remember.

I wonder if a day will come where I get to see Mount Rainier up close and personal once again...

Last Century Tulips With Jason & Joey Plus Mount Rainier

Incoming Tulip email, this morning, from my Favorite Nephew Jason, with a Tulip photo from way back in 1988. The explanatory text follows. And following that a new photo of Mount Rainier...

More Skagit flower photos to share…

This one was dated 1988.

Picture must have been taken on a Friday, as Umbarger students were asked to wear Red and White on Fridays. (I usually complied. FNJ2 was usually out of compliance).

This was taken before school in April of ‘88.  

I remember that morning well. We all ate breakfast out that morning.  This was for sure a real treat for me, at a newly opened Burlington restaurant.  I think I enjoyed my Egg McMuffin more that morning than the tulips.  It was better than the usual bowl of Cheerios or Oatmeal. McDonald’s at that time was new to Burlington.  And breakfast was very new to McDonald’s. 

Ironic, that FNJ2 and I and FBJ now live in the same spot 35 years later.

______________________

The Umbarger to which Jason refers is Lucille Umbarger Elementary School. The school colors of which are red and white. FNJ2 is Favorite Nephew Joey. FBJ is Favorite Brother Jake, who is the paternal parental unit of Jason and Joey.

And now the promised Mount Rainier photo.

 A week or so ago, two of my favorite Washingtonians, Chris and Sheila, moved to the new home they had built in the town known as Lacey, a few miles east of Washington's state capitol of Olympia.

Chris and Sheila picked a building lot with a backyard view of Mount Rainier, which is the view you see above.

I was recently asked by a Texan if it makes Washingtonians nervous to be living near so many volcanoes. The answer to that is no. I suppose due to the fact that we grow up in Washington with volcanoes always being a reality. And only one has blown up, Mount St. Helens, in our lifetimes.

Mount Rainier pulling a Mount St. Helens type big boom would be a real real real bad thing...