Trip

We are back from Portland and surrounding area. It was a nice trip. We spent 3 nights in Portland. With 1 day at a investment seminar and 2 days doing tourist stuff. We went to the Japanese Garden in Portland (the largest one outside of Japan) and drove up to the Columbia Gorge. Very nice scenery with the river and many waterfalls. (pictures coming to my website later.)

On Wednesday we drove to Mt Rainier National Park taking the scenic route by Mt St Helens. That was very interesting. It is very hard to imagine the scope of the devastation there. After 25 years it is still quite evident with fallen trees, and barren areas with nothing but ash and rock. We could not see any current activity at the top of the volcano due to clouds, but we could see the bottom of the crater.

Mt Rainier was very nice and we were extremely lucky with the weather. We had brief but good views of the mountain during late and early breaks in the clouds.

We stayed at the Paradise Inn which is literally at the foot of the mountain. There is an excellent network of trails originating near the inn and visitor center. And after the hike I took I was quite ready to collapse in front of the fire in the lobby of the inn. Yes, it's June. Yes, I said fire. The part of the trail I hiked was a little over a mile one way. But had an elevation gain of 1000 feet (from 5300 to 6300 AMSL)! I guess those trips to the gym are paying off! Once above 6000 feet about 1/3 of the trail was still covered with snow.