North Cascades: Miscellaneous

We decided that we needed to go back to Washington Pass so Mom could see it, so the 1st part of the day involved driving back out Highway 20! 

As we drove this time stopped at all the interesting things we’d seen the other times we’d driven the road but not been able to stop and look at!  We looked at all the overlooks and waterfalls and took lots of pictures.

When we got to Washington Pass it was much cloudier than it had been yesterday, but it was still impressive and Mom was impressed! We had a picnic lunch there – in the car because it was so windy & cold!  It was 48 degrees!

After lunch we drove back to the Newhalem area, once again stopping to look at interesting flowers and pretty views!

When we got back we stopped at the Skagit General Store in Newhalem – it was just your basic middle of nowhere convenience store, but Mom found some stuff to buy!

There are a number of small, relatively flat trails in the Newhalem Campground area and one can walk from the general store the campground via the “Trail of Cedars” trail.  Dad and I sent mom back to the campground in the car and he and I headed out down the trail. 

We took a side trip to Ladder Creek Falls, which wasn’t that impressive, and then continued on to the Trail of the Cedars. 

The Trail of the Cedars is a flat, almost paved trail that winds through a grove of big cedar trees!  Almost everything is covered with moss and it looks a lot like a rainforest! The moss seems to have attacked anything that is on the ground like kudzu!

It was only about a mile or maybe 2 back to the campground and since it was flat we walked it quickly!

When we got back I had some RV chores to take care of – my water tank was just about empty, I needed to fill it and treat it with chlorine to kill anything that might be in it (who knows what the person before me put in the water tank!) and the battery was low so I wanted to drive it for a little while to charge it up!

Dumping the RV is one of those things that sounds like it would be awful, but really it’s not too hard, or too gross.  This dump however was the exception!  It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but it sure was stinky!  The good news is that now I know which valve is the black tank (toilet stuff) and which is the grey (shower, sink water) tank which will make the process a lot neater next time!

I got it all taken care of and Dad helped me get it parked back on my site!

North Cascades is an interesting park. I think it may be the best kept secret in the whole national park service  It’s huge and the scenery rivals, or is better than, anything seen in the “big” National Parks like Denali, Glacier or Grand Teton, however, there is almost no one here.  There are only a handful of campers in the campground, the overlooks have been almost deserted, and we have never seen more than 2 or 3 cars at the visitor center.  I find this amazing considering that Grand Teton or even the Smokies are likely teeming with people and have huge traffic jams and crowded campgrounds! We have been discussing why this is and the best we can figure is that it’s because of the remoteness of the park.  Yes, the park is about 2 hours from Seattle, but to get to the high country it’s a long day trip. Other than campgrounds, there are no places to stay, I’m sure that keeps the tourists away! I’m betting that most the vacationers are down at Mt. Rainier NP and that our week there will be a whole different experience!  I’m really glad that we came here and that we stayed for 5 nights as it gave us a chance to really get to know the park! 

The other interesting thing about North Cascades is that the NPS has a very small foothold here, they pretty much run the campground, visitor center and 1 overlook – the majority of the area falls under the jurisdiction of the National Forest Service!

North Cascades Misc.