I’m giving myself 15 minutes – that’ll be until 1:30, when I should probably go do real life stuff, like laundry and cleaning and get ready to head to Seattle.

It’s been crazy busy since July 7. That is when my  uncle, Tim, and Beth, his wife (to me, they are  “TimAndBeth”, as everyone calls them) came to the PNW for the first time ever. They requested no city stuff, or minimal anyway – they, esp. Tim, wanted to hit the woods. And the woods, we hit. Except for Seattle on Friday – the usual suspects of Pike Place Market and SurLaTable. For some reason, I thought going to Seattle Center would be cool. I don’t know why. EMP wasn’t worth it at 4 p.m. and well, there’s not much else there. The monorail was a nice place to sit though.

Saturday was Mt Rainer via Sunrise. I wanted to take them to Burroughs Mountains via Wonderland Trail, but it’d been a while since i’d been up there, so we took a wrong trail, which was essentially one that went up, up, up, up, eventually hitting a snow patch. Beth stopped at that point, so Tim and I continued on for a bit to get “just a little closer” to The Mountain. If we let him, he would have kept going. We nicknamed him “Mountain Goat” b/c he was just relentless. He’s determined to lose some wieght now and come back and we’re going to do more hiking at Mt. Rainier.

Road Trip Note: Wally’s Drive-In Diner in Buckley is awesome.

Sunday was the North Olympic Mountains and Crescent Lake. Marymere Falls Trail. Great trail for getting an idea of true PNW/Olympic vegetation. Huge firs, stumps from old growth, natural waterfalls, ferns galore. Then over to the wrong end of Spruce Railroad Trail. I read the trail book wrong and we started at the most uninteresting and boring end of the trail. But it was 6 p.m. at this point and we still had to drive back to Bremerton. I also was  2-1 on successful trail finds at this point.

OH and dinner was on the waterfront in Port Angeles. Don’t go there – Downriggers or something like that. Worst seafood experience ever. Bland and gross everything. But the view was pretty spectacular and we watched the B.C. ferry come in and unload – an amazing feat in itself, birthing from its steel womb many semi-trailers and RVs.

Monday, up and at it again – this time, with intentions to Staircase Rapids. But the volunteer at the Oly National Park visitor’s center suggested another trail like it, without going into the park but it was by Duckabush or Dosewallips (i can’t keep the two straight and i’m too lazy to look it up right now). Anyway, we eventually find it an hour later and it turns out to be this very well maintained trail in the middle of nowhere. And it wasn’t flat – it was all uphill. The trail goes for a mile, then comes upon a 100-ft tall waterfall. Here’s video of Tim and I, after we scrambled to the bottom, we climbed back out.

http://www.youtube.com/user/everyfrog

I’ll get to posting pictures later. There’s a lot. A LOT. Tim had his nice camera. So we have A LOT.

Tuesday was their last full day in town – I went to work and met them in Seattle for the final hurrah – Dinner at Ivar’s on the waterfront, with views of the ferry.

The whole time was a fantastic experience and I’m glad they came to visit. Exhausting and on the go, but so much fun. Very much like a road trip with Grandma and Grandpa. Saw all the sights and tailgated daily with PBJs, sodas and chips.

OK, 1:35. I’ve sort of met my deadline. Next up, mom’s trip out here.