A 12:30 pm ferry from Lopez to Anacortes - we were lucky to get on - surprising given we were nearly 2 hours early for it!  But only 60 20-foot slots were allotted for that ship's voyage.  We were #30 in line.

The drive to Seattle was easier in the carpool lane of I-490, rather than I-5.

3:30 pm arrival in our Seattle KOA allowed time to do laundry, swim in the pool, have dinner, enjoy playground time with Dad, and visit with a family with a lovely, chocolate-brown, 1988 Lazy Daze arriving just across from us.

We reserved online the very last campsite available for the Lazy Daze Northwest gathering - its in Oregon this coming weekend- how lucky for us!

We've driven over 13,000 miles on our trip - we crossed it on our way to Anacortes the other day!

Ned heads for the airport in the morning- we are very sad to see him go.  He got to experience Olympic National Park, the stunning town of Victoria, and visiting family on Lopez Island.  We've had a wonderful visit and will likely see him the next time upon our arrival home.  It is never easy to say goodbye, though.

8.28.08     N. Cascades NP to Seattle, WA

Ned joined us today- Hooray!  That's our big news.

This morning we drove from North Cascades NP thru Darrington, where we saw the huge wood mills.  It made us sad every time a big truckload of old trees drove by- we had a reality check about how much wood and paper we use.  How do we renew the resource of trees that took 80 years to grow?  If we plant 10 times the trees that we’d use for our log cabin, would it be ethical to use those trees- It was an interesting discussion with the kids.

We stopped for groceries and then went to call our friend from The Woodlands, Christy, to see if we could “swing by” to Redmond to visit with her.  However, it was now close to 2pm entering Seattle, which is known for bad traffic.  Since we had to go all the way through town to the south, I decided that maybe we can come back up to see her since Ned’s flight was coming in soon.

Well!  Driving I-5 through Seattle was terrible!  It is a long trip (over 50 miles) on multiple, 70 mph lanes, similar to driving through Houston or Atlanta.  Fortunately, we were able to take our exit just when accident traffic shut down the road.  Unfortunately, I’m not taking that road again so I’ll have to meet Christy some other way/time.  We made it to the campground just in time to cook dinner and get organized.

Ned took a cab in 5pm traffic from the airport that was 4.5 miles from the campground- we are so happy to see him!  We had a delicious lasagna/salad/garlic bread dinner with brownies for dessert- also celebrated Lia’s 8^th “Gotcha Day” today!

The Seattle KOA here ($65) is like a resort, although highway traffic is disruptive.  Choices in Seattle are very limited.  We enjoyed the movie “Cheaper by the Dozen 2” last night at the campground and laughed a lot.  Swimming in the pool is fun.  We’re headed to the pancake breakfast in the morning!

Then our plan this week is to visit Olympic National Park, Victoria, and family on Lopez Island before Ned has to head home.

Finally, we drive towards Seattle where we will spend a couple of days relaxing and taking it easy before moving on.  My wife has a cousin who resides in Kent, a suburb of Seattle.  We don't get to visit her and her husband near often enough, so it's nice to be able to spend a couple of days just relaxing and getting up-to-date.

Gas was only $2.839. Sweet.

Waterfalls = 26, bridges = 4, tunnels = 6

Up bright and early for another day of long travel.  We still have nearly 450 miles to go today before our journey is through.  We don’t have any planned stops today; we’ll just cruise along and make the numerous stops for food and necessities as we go. 

We start with a nice breakfast at the hotel.  Good coffee, orange juice, rolls, scrambled eggs, etc.  A very expanded continental breakfast.  More than we had expected.

The weather today is nice a crisp with a few clouds floating by but really sunny and clear most of the time.  The air is clean and the flowers are all in bloom.  They have a much later spring as you travel north. 

Just north of Medford we pass Table Rock just to our east and get a couple of pictures.  It’s a little strange to see a mesa in this part of the country.

Also along the way we can get just a glimpse of Mount Rainier in the clouds to the east.

It’s so nice to be out of the San Joaquin valley where everything is dry and dusty tan colored and into the wonderful Oregon scenery.  It’s always nice to see new things and places.

We made a few stops along the way today, as you would expect and arrived in Kent by about 5 p.m..  My wife’s cousin was waiting for us and greeted us with big hugs.  It was so nice to have that thousand mile drive behind us. 

Her husband was soon home from work and their kids and grandkids all came over to chat and catch up on the news from our area and family around our neck of the woods.

We chatted through the early evening and they fixed us a wonderful dinner out on their barbeque.  He and his sons are avid hunters and had brought back quite a few deer recently.  Having never eaten deer before we looked forward to the opportunity.  These steaks were tender and not at all gamey as some people say they may be. Actually very hard to tell they weren’t beef.    

We sat around by an outdoor fire until ten or eleven o’clock.  Boy it gets dark late up there.  Where I live at that time of year the sun sets around 7 to 7:30 p.m., but that far north it was at least two hours later.  But it had really begun to cool off and by night fall it was down into the fifties. 

We retired to our guest cottage late and slept like babies in the nice little double bed. Cozy but comfortable.

It was drizzley and overcast as we made our way from Olympic National Park.  We stopped at a restaurant along the way for dinner, then headed towards our next destination, Mt Rainier.  There weren't too many available campgrounds in that area, so we called to make a reservation for a KOA in Kent.  We were told by the reservation center that there were no more tent sites available, and if we wanted to stay there we would have to pay extra for an RV site. They cost more because of water and electricity, neither of which we needed.  When we arrived, we gound our site was paved and narrow, and barely fit our truck...never mind 2 tents.  We were ALSO surprised to find that there was PLENTY of tent space available, as they had a separate tenting "area", just not individual "sites".  The reservation center in South Dakota had no clue, and the camp itself was closed by the time we arrived.  So, we paid too much for a site we couldn't even use! We set up in the tenting area (right next to a highway) and got up and out of there as soon as we could in the morning. This was one of only 2 campgrounds we didn't care for on the trip.