Wrapping up our Northwest Expedition

We wanted to show the kids Seattle, but we were running out of time in WA.  So we decided to make it a quick pit stop on our way home from Canada, instead of it's own day trip. 


But first, we had to stop at Camping World.  When we first starting going to Camping World at the beginning of our trip, the kids loved it.  They'd look around at all the cool RV gadgets and gizmos.  However...this is their opinion of Camping World stops now:

They make a beeline to the comfy recliners with their DS systems :)
They are good sports though...they let us take care of business as long as we need to and don't complain.

Seattle from the north...

It's been a long day after our trip to Canada, but we took a quick truck tour of some of the most famous landmarks in Seattle.

The Space Needle...

just happened to be celebrating her 50th birthday while we there.

This was really a quick photo...we pulled up in a bus zone, the kids and I jumped out,
I snapped this one photo and we all jumped back in----or so I thought.
As we were pulling away we heard someone yell, "Hey, wait, wait!"
All of us in the truck started looking around for the voice.  Then, I looked onto the sidewalk
and discovered Daniel running down the sidewalk waving his arms yelling at us!!
Oooooops!  Jon and I thought everyone jumped in and we were in such a hurry to get out of the
no parking zone.
So glad that we looked for the voice before we drove off completely!
(This incident led to a great discussion about what to do in an emergency if stranded, etc.)

Very cool art:

an umbrella turned inside out :)

Classic Seattle!

We saw funny road signs...

Actually, I think this was for real....but considering "west of here" was the Puget Sound...

Pike Place Market

Unfortunately, we got there too late for the fish throwing, but just

in time to see them cleaning up the store :)

So, we watched the fish throwing on YouTube...

The Original Starbucks!

We had a very quick trip in Seattle, but we had fun. :)  Jon scared the kids on the steep hills by "rolling" backwards at the stop signs.  They were all screaming :)

(Remember, we have Florida kids...they aren't used to HILLS.)

Back at the campsite, we had more good times.  We had a couple of BBQ dinners on the picnic table (yay, for nice weather.)

Faith and I teamed up against Jolie and DT in a rousing game of keep away. 

Daddy took the kids fishing...

Using the watershed management skills he got while at
OMSI:  Oregon Museum of Science and Industry

School is still in session, too:  

We took the kids on one more adventure in the great northwest:

Northwest Trek
A Wilderness Park and Nature Preserve
http://www.nwtrek.org

The first stop at the park was to take an hour long tram ride through the free roaming area of the park.

Jon and I kept expecting a dinosaur to jump out from the trees ala Jurassic Park :)

We saw every large animal that they have in this area:  bison, big horn sheep, black tail deer, elk, trumpeter swans, mountain goats, and the best one... a moose!

The animals love the cooler weather so they were very active.  Unlike people :)  We had the place to ourselves...it was awesome!

Jolie's favorite...the bison herd

They were on either side of our tram!

Big horn sheep and black tail deer

Roosevelt Elk herd

A mountain goat just chillaxin' by the road!

This was the best find of the day... a moose!
Apparently, they are very elusive to the tram tour.

After our tram tour, we toured the rest of the park.  We went on a nature trail that had a quest challenge for the kids.

They conquered the quest and found the treasure!

We learned so much from three different animal presentations.

Since we were practically the only people there, the kids had their 1,000 questions answered.  The staff was so patient, kind, and very engaging with the kids.

We got to learn in depth about the Red Tail Hawk, two different owls, and a bat!
The bat was actually very cute!
During one of the owl presentations, a hawk flew overhead and the owl spotted it and puffed up to twice it's normal size.
That was the coolest thing we've seen! 

There were also a couple of animal pelt carts along the path.  They also answered tons of questions :)

This pelt...any guesses?

We saw it live next...

A cougar!

Although this one looks like a pelt all cozy in its den :)
We loved seeing the cougar...since we've been living in one for 8 months!

The cute bat is on the left....

 The NW Trek is also an outdoor zoo to critters native to the area.

(It's very much like the Sonoran Desert Museum in Tucson, AZ  http://www.desertmuseum.org) 

We saw bald and golden eagles, many owls, otters, wolves, coyotes, wolverines, grizzly bears, and more.

These two raccoons were so funny to watch.  The one in front kept picking up items and "hand washing" them.

There was only 25 feet and that tiny fence between this black bear and us!

We had a great day at the Northwest Trek.  The kids said the tram ride through the animals was one of their favorite things so far.  They LOVED seeing the wild animals up close in their habitats.

Hm...I wonder if Yellowstone NP will beat this?

We spent our last day in Washington attending church at our old home church, shopping at the commissary, and doing laundry.  We're spiritually fired up, were fueled up, and all cleaned up....and ready for our trip east!

Oh, Canada!

This is our plan for the day...

a little jaunt north to get our passports stamped :)

We departed from Joint Base Lewis-McChord...

for a 3 hour tour drive to the border.

We drove past this city with a very recognizable skyline:

Seattle!
We'll visit you on the way back :)

The official International Boundary:

We'll be in Canada in a nanosecond.

Actually, make that 40 minutes...after we get through the border guards...aka:  Immigration and Customs

You can tell the who are the Canadian locals:
convertible top down while it is 44* and cloudy!

We had a lot of time to people/car watch while we waited for our turn.

Look who we spot heading back into the United States---

it's Scooby Doo and Shaggy in The Mystery Machine!  :)

We're all craving Scobby Snacks now :)

We're next, yippee!

The kids are definitely ready!

Well, getting through the border was a little tougher than we thought.  We didn't expect the guard's questions to be so "difficult".

1.  "Where do you live?" Um...rootless right now.

2.  "Where do the kids go to school?" Um...in our rootless RV.

3.  "When is the last time you transported your firearms?"  Um...how do you know we have firearms?  I digress...last Sept. when we put them in storage.

4.  "Why would you make this long trip without your firearms?"  Because we knew we wanted to go to Canada to get our passports stamped.

Those were just a few of the questions.  We took much longer than the car in front of us!  We were ready for her to send us to the "Secondary Inspection" area, but praise the Lord... she smiled, stamped the kids' passports, and said, "Enjoy Canada."

Whew...

The kids didn't really understand stand the interrogation and said, "Wow, she was so nice!  She was asking so many great questions to get to know us!"  :)

Yippeee... new stamp!
Costa Rica, USA, and Canada

Oh, Canada!

Believe it or not, we drove 3 hours one way, waited for another 40 minutes to get through customs...all without a plan on what to do once we got here.  We didn't even have a Canadian map!

We just wanted to look around and grab a snack and some postcards before heading back.  We almost made it to Victoria, but decided since we had no navigational aids besides my excellent sense of direction (seriously, I'm the GPS on our expedition)... we decided to enjoy the countryside and then head back to Surrey for our snack.

We actually had no intention of stopping at a McDonald's, but most of the shopping and stores 10 miles across the border looked just like America!  Subway, Pizza Hut, etc.  Everyone wanted ice cream so we decided to check this out for grins.

It's kinda hard to tell from this picture, but our white, American pick-up truck in the middle of the photo dwarfed all the cars in the parking lot.  In fact, it was really tight in the parking lot!

We were so surprised at how nice this McDonald's is!  That is a fireplace over Faith's head!  It felt so good on this chilly day.

And in the top right corner of the photo...

Hockey was on, of course!  :)

Even though we had chilly temps this day, spring has arrived in British Columbia.  The flowers were so pretty and unique.

Time to head back to the good 'ol USA.   

Ah, more Immigrations and Customs lines...

I {heart} my homeland.

Mt. Rainier National Park

We were blessed to get to visit a gorgeous national park and then...

we were exceptionally blessed to have sunshine for our visit!

Thank-you Lord!

Mt. Rainier National Park
http://www.nps.gov/mora

Ah, blue skies and bluer rivers greet us at Mt. Rainier NP.

Checking out the museum/visitor center to learn about Mt. Rainier and pick up junior ranger books.
Did you know that Mt. Rainier is an active volcano?!

Diligent with their studies.

First trail hike is Trail of the Shadows.

We did this primarily for the junior ranger books, but

I'm so glad that we did!!  It was a fantastic trail!  We

learned about some of the founders of the park, saw the springs, 

and TONS of wildlife.  It was a beautiful trail, too.  What a surprise find!

Red breasted Sap Suckers!
Can you spot 2 of them?

We saw lots of evidence of beaver activity...
I've never seen a tree like this "in the wild" before!

Black Tail deer

We also saw baby squirrels and heard lots of different birds.  And Mt. Rainier kept peeking out around the bends in the trail :)

After the hike, we had a picnic lunch in the woods.  

Then, we headed deeper into the park towards Paradise, at the base of Mt. Rainier.  Along the way, we stumbled upon another AMAZING trail.  We had to trod through some snow, so we almost didn't go.  This is what we would have missed!

Looking downstream...

But, when you turn around...this is the view!

That is Mt. Rainier in the background.  It was sunny all around the park, but the
clouds decided to hug the top of the mountain most of the afternoon  :(

Almost our family Christmas picture...boo on you clouds!

We totally enjoyed this creek and walking across this bridge.  It was just gorgeous and the kids loved playing along the banks.

DT loved throwing big rocks off the bridge...glad Monty is there to hold on to him!

Onward up the mountain to Paradaise

Glacier track up close.

One of the many other mountain peaks in the area.

The visitor center at Paradise

This is a really nice visitor center.  The wonderful displays are located on the second floor.  The second floor is all windows on two sides.  One side is Mt. Rainer and the other side is this view:

This is taken from the second floor of the visitor center...
Those are some DEEP snowbanks!

There are binocular stations along each windowed wall.  We could actually see hikers making their way up Mt. Rainier!  You couldn't see them without the binoculars.

Well done kids... Mt. Rainier Junior Rangers!

Outside the visitor center at Paradise.
That is Mt. Rainier...clouds are still hugging the top.
And now we know there are hikers up there today!

This is one of the smaller snow banks!
I forgot to take a picture of the 30' snowbank. :(

The view driving back down...
Mt. Rainier NP road is closed at Paradise due to snow, so we had to turn around.

The view from the top...looking down at the glacier track.
(This is the one I took the picture of when crossing the bridge waaaay down below.  It wasn't
as impressive in the close up.)

We have had some amazing views out of our windshield on this trip! 

After driving across the bridge, we got out and walked it.

Here is the view from the bridge:

(Dear clouds, go away already!)

One last hike of the day:

Near the trailhead is this great view of Mt. Rainier...oh, and those pesky clouds!

Jolie wanted all visitors to know that this park was created by God :)
Her writing says, "No million years.  -God"

This hike took us to where a bridge used to be before the volcano

shook and reshaped the landscape and path of Kautz Creek.

Come on clouds....move off the top of the mountain!!!
Mt. Rainier is RIGHT there!

The top of Mt. Rainier has been playing peek-a-boo with me all day...
and now the kids are getting in on the act :)

When we made it back to the trailhead, we decided to take one last look at Mt. Rainier, just in case the clouds decided to move along.

And we were rewarded!!!

Hello, Gorgeous!!