Volcanoes and Paradise
Mount Rainier, Mount St. Helens, and a Wedding in Upstate NY September 12- October 1, 2014 Driving away from the San Juan Islands early was difficult. Raja was having issues so we just took off, caught the ferry, and then drove to Silver Creek, WA. Silver Creek would be our home base while we visited Mount Rainier and Mt St Helens. Before we could play tourists we had to play parents so we drove Raja to Portland to get checked up by Dr. Stephanie Harvey, a dear friend who just so happens to be living on the West Coast. Luckily, Raja’s blood work was normal and her radiographs (x-rays) just showed some degenerative joint disease (arthritis) in her pelvis. Our assumption was that she fell in the RV. Actually after several days back in the RV we noticed that Raja would no longer go to her favorite ‘sun’ spot up on the dashboard by the steering wheel. So we think she probably got caught up on the steering wheel while jumping down. Fortunately, several days of pain medication and rest had our sweet old lady back to her talkative self! After patching up the cat we decided it was again time for the tourist us, so we drove to Mount Rainier National Park. Our destination this day was the Paradise area. What a beautiful drive and hike. The mountain peaked out showing us it’s magnificence, and the marmots where playing and chatting around every trail bend. It was a better hike than either of us thought it would be, which for us is a pleasant surprise. Needless to say we really enjoyed ourselves! Exhausted, the next few days were spent on [...]