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A day in Paradise, Mount Rainier National Park


Since it was Labor day weekend we knew that Mount Rainier would be busy. We left the motel early so we could park at Paradise. Beautiful morning, the weather was perfect. Mount Rainier was clouded in on top, but still a pretty awesome site. Headed up the Skyline trail with no real destination in mind, we were just there to enjoy the views and hike until we were tired. Met lots of nice folks on the trail, one couple gave us some interesting facts about Mount St. Helen's. Which was where we were at the the day before. Too bad he wasn't around when we toured Mount St. Helen's to give us more facts on site. From the Skyline trail we branched off onto the Paradise Glacier trail. Short trail, lovely display of flowers blooming among the rocks. Confiscated a large rock and ate a early lunch before continuing. The clouds around the mountain continued to lift, so that by the time we were back to the parking lot it was almost off. The trails started to get really busy by about 10 AM. Lots of people coming and going. We made a fairly large loop around dropped off the mountain down onto the Golden Gate Trail, stopped and watched hoary marmots playing in the grass. Back to the parking lot to watch the clouds lift and people watch. Mass amount of traffic, so glad we got an early start. As we headed out of the park the traffic just kept coming, got to the entrance gate and there was about 2 1/2 miles of cars waiting to get into the park. Wow that's a lot of people. It was a beautiful day, lots of flowers still blooming, lovely hike, even with all the people out it was a great side trip. I am going to bore you with lots of pictures, and more pictures.
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