On the Road Again

Thursday, July 26th, 2012  Drive to Glacier National Park, Montana



This morning we a relaxing time of sleeping, swimming, and packing (AGAIN- we will be glad to not be packing and unpacking the car when we get home but the kids are doing well with it).  The kids did not want to leave here and were actually pleading to stay longer.  Thanks again for the great time, Aunt Denise and Uncle Terry!!!!  It is nice to have a clean car and dry stuff to organize back in the car.  Aunt Denise stood in the driveway to actually see if our taillights were heading down the road....she wanted to make sure we did not hide behind the garage :)

Our staging area

 We were starting our trek toward Glacier National Park which was in Montana. It was about 8 hours drive so we were all a little slow getting back in the car but the kids have been EXCEPTIONAL at traveling.  It has been such a blessing that we have all gotten along so well.  We had gotten to Spokane, WA when all out electronics stopped working,  Supposedly, we blew a fuse.  Our DVD finally gave up the ghost while we were in CA and Dave tried to fix it at the Campbells, which the fuse did not like.  So....2 hours later, a new fuse, a new DVD player and Little Caesars Pizza, we were back on the road.  We were hoping to get close to Glacier but did not know how close we could get tonight.  After making some calls to hotels (which were all full) we started looking for campgrounds.  We stopped at one but all the kids wanted to keep going.  We drove through Idaho and into Montana, the scenery was absolutely gorgeous.  We gained an hour here and we loved watching the sunset.  At 10:30pm, we could STILL see the sky to the west a beautiful blue with the silhouette of the landscape.  AWESOME!!  The Montana Sky is breathtaking!



The Montana Sky



We finally found a nice campground, Rocky Mountain High in Kalispell, Montana at 11:30pm.  Chris and Josh helped us quickly pop the tent up, threw the sleeping bags in and we all rolled into bed.  It was a nice, cool evening, perfect for sleeping.  We even put the rain fly on just to help make sure it didn't get too chilly.  Here are some of my little sleepers in the morning.



We did receive some bad news today.  Cammi Hudson's step dad was killed in an automobile accident today.  We are so sorry about this hard situation that their family is going through and we have and will be praying for them in these coming days.  We are so glad that we got to visit with them and so sad that they are going through this.  You are in our thoughts and prayers.

Playday at the Campbells



Thank you Aunt Denise&
Uncle Terry for a great day!


 Wednesday, July 25th, 2012   Vacation at the Campbells



What a crew!



Ahhh.....it felt good to sleep.  Some of us started wandering out around 9:30am but Jonathan slept until 11am!  WAY TO GO!!!  Aunt Denise made us a wonderful breakfast of eggs, bacon and fruit.  Yummy!  We were all moving slowly this morning and I was surprised that the boys were able to move at all after their climb yesterday!



Claire and Annika

Aunt Denise went to pick up some cousin for us to play and swim with for the day.  They were Emma (age 11), Claire (almost 6) and Mac who is 2.  We dressed for the pool (it is HOT here) and spent the day staying cool there! 



Crazy Driver!



It was quite the crew of kids there and they enjoyed playing together.  Aunt Denise made a huge lunch of a pot of soup, noodles, a pizza and pounds of fruit....GONE...it was all just gone!!!!!   Dave and I took advantage of this time to catch up on laundry and Dave took the car to get it cleaned INSIDE and OUT!!!  It is much better now.  We also laid out all our tenting items to let them dry completely.  We were quite a sight and we so appreciate Aunt Denis and Uncle Terry letting us take over their driveway.

We also had fun driving the motorized cars around the driveway and Jonathan has discovered the dartboard...watch out everyone, here he comes.  He did beat Uncle Andy in his first game but then Uncle Terry had to show him the ropes a bit.  Anyway, we spent lot of time at the dartboard today.  There were some neighborhood boys who came over and played football with Josh and Chris. They were evenly matched and had fun!



Playing football!



The Crew!



Marcus (my cousin) and his wife, Cammi, came over in the afternoon to visit with us for a bit.  They needed to leave early to take Emma to her last swim meet but we enjoyed the time that we had with them.  Uncle Terry's mother, Jerri, and my other cousin, Andy, showed up also.  We loved talking to him and catching up.  We talked about many memories of growing up:  Andy singing "Feelings"  (I could not get him to do it again), rafting at Ashbaugh, spitting watermelon seeds and many other.  We miss Grama and Grampa and are very thankful for the memories that we have! 

 Aunt Denis and Uncle Terry put on a huge feast of steak and crab. The kids were VERY pleased to discover crab! They had fun cracking open their own crabs and playing with their food, per se :)  It was an incredible meal and we were stuffed.  Thank you!  Thank you!

Everyone started leaving and we started calming down.  We went to sit outside and enjoy the beautiful evening, when Uncle Terry suggested cooking smores. Of course, my kids were all over that!! :)  We had a marvelous time enjoying the fire, talking together and sampling some of Uncle Terry's new invention:  a "SNEER".  It is a marshmallow filled with chocolate and then melted to the perfect temperature.  No graham crackers allowed.  It was a huge hit and we tried to talk Uncle Terry into a different name....but not yet :)



Thank you Uncle Terry and Aunt Denise for loving us so much and giving us a wonderful day to relax and play!  We are very thankful for this time and the memories that we all gained. We love you all and so appreciate all the ways you blessed us!





Adventures At Rainier





Tuesday, July 24, 2012  Mt. Rainier

Thank you Lord!!!  We woke up to a beautiful, gorgeous sunny day and guess what we saw outside our hotel....Mt. Rainier.  I know that the Lord blessed us, with both safety on Sunday with the blown tire but we then changed our Rainier date to today.  We can see the most beautiful mountain in the world.  Yeah!!!!

Mt. Rainier....HERE WE COME!!!!!    We arrived later than we hoped, around 1pm.  We got the boys ready for their hike and set them off.  We prayed for their safety, strength and wisdom in climbing and then they set off to conquer the mountain.  Mt. Rainier is 14,400 feet and Camp Muir is at 10,300 feet.  We started at Paradise which is 5,300 feet so it was going to be a BIG climb.  I was nervous for the boys as Dave and I had attempted to summit many years ago, so I knew how difficult the climb was going to be.  We had climbed to Camp Muir the day before and then started our summit at 1am.  It was one of the most amazing and taxing adventures that I have ever attempted.  There is nothing like climbing in snow to the light of a star-lite sky.  We saw a beautiful sunrise but unfortunately, we hit the first snowstorm of the year.  We were turned back shy of the summit and climbed (in the snowstorm) all the way back down to Paradise where we arrived at 10 pm.  It was a big day, to say the least.  So....I was excited for the boys to experience this but also nervous for them.



Jonathan's marmot.



After Dave, Josh and Chris set off, Jonathan, Annika and  I checked out the visitor's center.  We watched a great movie on Mt. Rainier and hit the gift shop. Then we started our own hike....up to a wonderful snowfield.  WOW!!  What an incredible hike that we are blessed to take.  God has blessed us with such a gift of a beautiful day to enjoy this incredible mountain.  We walked up (and I have to say the climb was steep- I was really praying for the guys!).  We enjoyed our walk and



Annika's snowman, Henry.

often stopped to smell the flowers and enjoy the view.  We got up to the snowfield and the kids were so excited to run, play, slide, jump, make snowmen and throw snowballs in the snow.  Their hands did get chilly after touching the snow but we were completely comfortable in shorts and t-shirts.  We hiked up pretty far in the snowfield and would stop to rest and enjoy the view.  We were up in the snowfield for about 3 hours and it was heavenly.  Jonathan loved taking pictures and took some wonderful one of the trees, mountain and the beautiful wildflowers.

Annika taking a little rest.

As the sun started going down, we headed back down the mountain.  We had a wonderful afternoon playing and enjoying our time together.  We arrived back down in Paradise around 6:40 pm so we checked out the rest of the Visitor's Center before it closed at 7 pm.  Then we got some dry clothes on and went to get some food at the cafe in the Paradise Lodge. It was a beautiful building and there was someone playing piano which we enjoyed.  Then we headed back to the parking lot to wait for our guys to come down. It ended up being only about an hour that we waited for the guys, and we listened to some of Narnia on CD.

Meanwhile, the boys kept climbing and climbing.  There was a lot of snow field to climb in, in fact the first thing Chris said when he got down was he hated snow. :)  They left Paradise at 1:40pm and ended up reaching Camp Muir at 7:00 pm.

Dave here.  We had an excellent climb and Josh and Chris did great.  Josh was slightly under the weather but powered through.  Chris was feeling good and could have "short roped" us both up.  I did drop my camera at about 8500 ft, and didn't notice it missing until 9000+ ft.  Losing the camera would mean no pictures for the entire hike and the thought made me sick (and the $150 cost of the camera).  I hiked down and was ecstatic to just barely see it sticking above the snow and still working.  Then came the hike back up to where the boys were waiting.  A quick note, hiking poles are crucial for any serious mountaineering.  I don't think we would have made the 5,000 ft vertical climb without them.  Especially with the extra 2 gallons of Gatorade that I apparently lugged up and down.

People camping by the Cowlitz glacier
near Camp Muir

The final 1000 vertical feet are the toughest because the camp never seems to get closer, but the boys powered through.

Josh and Chris were the youngest by about 10 years at Camp Muir.  We were slightly tempted when we saw that there was space available in the climbing hut at the camp, but we would have needed crampons, ice axes, a climbing rope, snow anchors, etc. for a summit attempt.  Next time.
We made it down in about 1 hour, 45 minutes and this included numerous glissading runs (sliding down the slope at sometimes high speeds).  I am very proud of the boys effort and couldn't have asked for more.  I told Tracy later that Josh and Chris had both found some iron inside.

 

On the way down

Camp Muir with the climber's hut.

I can't tell you how excited I was to see the boys coming out on the trail head.  Chris actually spotted me first and gave a huge wave with his pole.  Thank you Lord for your protection!  Thank you for the Magical day that you gave us.  They boys got off the mountain at 9:15pm and we were on the road about 9:35pm heading toward my Aunt Denise (my mom's sister) and Uncle Terry's house, which is in Yakima, WA. It was a 2 hour drive and we arrived around 11:30pm....very happy to climb into bed after climbing the mountain.  We were greeted by their cat, Allie, who was very pleased to see us and we were very happy to be there!



Our triumphant climbers



Good bye Mt. Rainier!  Thank you for an AWESOME day!

A Day in Seattle

At Pikes Market in Seattle with the fish-throwers.

                                                         
Monday, July 23, 2012   Seattle, WA

This morning we slept in at the Holiday Inn, had breakfast and decided to let the kids swim.  We have had some big days with a lot of hikes and with touring Seattle today, we thought we would take some time this morning. The weather was still a little cloudy today and we have not yet seen Rainier...hopefully soon!

Our first stop in Seattle was at the old house that Dave lived at while doing graduate work, The Scandinavia House.  The name is changed and only girls live there now but they were very nice and let us come in and look around.  It is remarkably unchanged for having been 20 years.  Dave even found a pair of hiking poles that he had hidden away all those years ago.  Then we drove through the University of Washington and enjoyed seeing the campus.  It has changed a lot but is very beautiful.  I found out that my Grampa had also gone there which I had not known.

The Hammer Man

We then headed downtown and parked close to Pikes Place.  We had just started walking when Annika bent over and found a dollar bill.  We looked around to see if someone had dropped some money but there was no one around who it looked like it might belong to.  She was excited about her find.  Not more than 30 SECONDS later, Jonathan bends over and finds a 5 dollar bill.  WHAT????  We really thought we might be on Candid Camera again- the kids are definitely liking this city :)

The kids with Rachel
the pig.



Aren't these beautiful flowers?

Pikes Place was remarkable as always.  The kids sat on Rachel the pig and we watched the fisherman chucking fish to and fro.  The kids said it was a little smelly here :)  There were people everywhere, fruit stands, flower stands....incredible prices.  We bought a huge bouquet of flowers for 5$ and then bought a bag of cherries and the juiciest peaches in the world.  Wow, they were very good and messy!!!  We also picked up some chocolate dessert linguine which we will try in Big Sky with Dave's family.  We walked though the whole place and found our way to the Gum Wall.  Have you heard of the Gum  Wall?  It is very interesting. Supposedly, someone started sticking gum on the wall and it STUCK......ha ha.  People keep adding their gum and it is an interesting place to visit.  Jonathan said it was disgusting :) and didn't want to stand next to it.  Jonathan also bought some fossilized amonites at a very cool gem store with some of the money that he found on the road.


The gum wall.



A closer look at the gum
wall.

Then we headed down to the wharf and looked for a little snack to hold us over until dinner.  We enjoyed seeing all the sights- they have a new HUGE Ferris wheel on the wharf, we could see the Space Needle and loved looking in some of the stores.  We settled on Fish and Chips at Ivars....mmmmmm!!  We sat out next to the water where we were encouraged to feed the seagulls.  The Fish and Chips were great and we shared some of our fries with the Seagulls.  The kids thought that was fun.    Annika asked if we lived here would we come here every day???



Our company for our
fish and chips snack.





My little bulls in the
candy store.

We started heading out and wanted to stop by REI quick to check for some items for our hike on Rainier tomorrow.  You have to go to the REI store in Seattle if you ever get a chance- they have a huge forest at the entrance so people could hike and bike ( to test out products).  Annika and Jonathan played in a huge tree fort while Dave and the other boys picked out some hiking poles for them to use tomorrow.  Fun store but not good on prices :)

It was about dinner time and we were eating at The Spaghetti Factory with the Frasers.  They were the ones who let us their house in Utah.  Well, they have a veterinary business in Seattle and we were able to meet up with them.  We had a wonderful dinner, we need to get some Spaghetti Factory's in Pennsylvania.  After our dinner, they gave us a tour of their beautiful facility, Pet Care.  It is such a wonderful facility and they have done an incredible job in building their business.  Dr. Fraser showed us all around, even doing an untrasound on Jonathan and letting them try out the x-ray machine.  We really enjoyed our tour and maybe someday Jonathan will be a veterinarian.  We loved our time with the Frasers and so appreciate their incredible generousity to us.

Well, it is 9:30pm and we are again heading our car back toward Rainier.  The boys really want to try to hike up to Camp Muir tomorrow so we want to get closer to Rainier.  We drove for about 2 hours and after many calls to hotels and some campgrounds, I was beginning to think that this might be the night that we had to sleep in our car.   We were REALLY glad when we found a Best Western to crash at.  Tonight was the first night that the kids were really tired as we brought them in.  Jonathan was wondering back and forth trying to find the bed (he didn't remember anything in the morning) and Annika had a little screaming fit and kept locking herself in the bathroom because she DIDN'T want to go to the bathroom.  :)  Good night!

Of Tires and Trails



On the Bridal Veil Falls Trail

Sunday, July 22, 2012

We packed up and headed our car toward Mt.Rainier about 10am.  It was a cloudy morning with a chance of meatballs, oops I mean rain.  I was concerned that we would be on the mountain and not even be able to see it.  We will see.  At about 10:30am, we heard a funny noise and pulled the car over to find a FLAT tire.  Really, really flat!  When Dave checked the other back tire, it was looking about ready to go also.  With all the extra weight in the back of the car, the tires were wearing unevenly (not to mention all the MILES :)  So....we got everyone out of the car, the weight off the back and Dave started changing the tire.  I called Triple A  to see where we could get new tires (especially since it was on a Sunday morning) and we found a Pep Boys in Puyallup, WA which was about 45 min. away.  So, after getting off the phone, Dave told me to call them back and say that we now DID need them to come help as our jack broke :(  Well, Triple A said a tow truck would be out in about an hour so I made some sandwiches and we sat down to wait.  Since it was Sunday morning, I suggested that we listen to Christy Nockels "Waiting Here For You".  I thought it would be an appropriate song :)  (not to mention that I love it).



The broken jack that
did us in.



 But God sent an angel to help us and someone pulled over with a jack.  We were changed and back on the road in no time (yes, we called to cancel the tow-truck).

We made it to Puyallup and got 2 new tires.  All in all, the tire blow took about 4 hours. The kids were great and even got compliments on their good behavior at Pep Boys.  But...this detour did change our plans so instead of Mt. Rainier today, we will need to visit it on Tuesday and today we were going to do a hike that Dave had done in graduate school called Bridal Veil Falls.

Washington state is gorgeous state and a favorite place for Dave to do hikes.  This hike was 1.7 miles each way with an 800 foot elevation climb.  It was lovely and when Dave had been here, there was a copper mine called the "Honeymoon Mine".  We were hoping to explore it a bit today also.  It turns out that the mine had been deemed "dangerous" and the trail had actually been changed, so we were not able to venture in a mine today.  Let me tell you...Jonathan was a disappointed little boy about that, mommy sighed a big sigh of relief :)  We started our climb and it is absolutely "heavenly".  I just love all the trees, ferns and rivers...ahhhh!  As we neared the top, it was definitely more of a climb and a bit treacherous.  The boys were like mountain goats leaping up the rocks and trail...we counted at least 160 steps going up to the falls.  Good workout!



Some of the many
steps we climbed.

   It was gorgeous at the Falls and I just love the views that we have been able to see.  I was a bit nervous as the boys like climbing out a bit to get a better view and that water is just so strong and swift but as it turns out we were all safe close to the falls....it was after that got us more.  Annika had gone a bit ahead of us as I was waiting to make sure everyone was safely away from the Falls...when we heard this screaming. There was a bridge (a very wide one) that she supposedly fell off of.  We are not sure what happened but thankfully she came away only with a scraped knee and a wet bottom.  We started back down and the top of the trail was definitely the trickiest.  Annika and I were moving slower so we stepped aside so Dave could pass us and catch up with the boys, when the edge of the trail gave way under his foot and he tumbled head first down the mountain.  It had not looked so steep as there were many thorns bushes growing right there but the ground went pretty straight down.  I grabbed one of Dave's feet (not that that helped him much) and we surveyed the situation.  There was not much for Dave to push off of as he was still only on bushes, not ground but he finally twisted enough to get his hand to me.  This still did us little good as I had a backpack on and was backed up against a rock....so, no leverage. In the midst of all this, Annika was screaming and  I start laughing.  (I think that my laughter was due to nervous energy from being afraid my whole family would fall off the mountain).  Good thing Dave is so strong and able to climb his way up my arm.  WHEW!! Thank you Lord for all your angels that are watching us on our trip.  It has been an exciting 24 hours for sure.

Refueling before finishing the hike



Bridal Veil Falls



The rest of the hike was uneventful and enjoyable.  It actually started raining just as we got in the car...perfect.  We started the drive to Seattle (actually to Lynnwood) and picked up Little Caesar's pizza for our drive.  We stayed at a Holiday Inn Express and thanked the Lord for another wonderful and safe day!!!