Disclaimer: This post is one of those that ended up being written years after the experience was had. Sadly, there were no notes taken so whatever is shared here must be extracted from the images and what memories they may have lent us. Fortunately, there was an itinerary still in my directory of travel plans, so that will help with some details. As to why this wasn’t noted or blogged about, I was in the throes of writing/editing my book Stay In The Magic and felt that any other deep writing would derail that fragile effort.

The day starts at the Chaco Canyon Cafe, an all-organic joint great for the vegetarians in the crowd, meaning Caroline. Our old friend Kirk is joining us, not just for breakfast but for the duration of the trip.

As I’m writing this here in 2021, I feel like I should get this out of the way right up front. Never hire friends, ever. Three years after this photo was taken, Rainy left Starbucks to work for me on a virtual reality startup. It couldn’t have been more than a few weeks after that start date that things turned adversarial. While Rainy ended up working for me until I fired everyone, things didn’t work out so “well” with Kirk. I’d already been operational for two years when Kirk joined us, moving from Seattle down to Phoenix for the opportunity. Through a series of blunders on my side and the general circumstances surrounding a startup, Kirk was fired along with the other 27 other members of the company. Things didn’t go well on his account, and we are no longer friends. Well, Rainy and I are no longer friends anymore either. I guess that should be expected when you not only fail yourself, and your investors but your vulnerable employees too. Sadly, I mostly purged Kirk’s presence from my site after our bitterly acrimonious falling out that hurt me deeply, but now that I feel like I could be over it, I miss that he was once a part of my life as he really was mostly a great guy.

I will not focus any more attention on Rainy and Kirk as neither of them will likely ever see these blog posts but I will include mentions and photos when they played an integral role in the course of the day.

Before leaving for Seattle, Caroline and I were considering a bike tour of the city if Rainier was locked under a cover of clouds, but waking under such beautiful skies and seeing that things were clear south of us, we headed for Mount Rainier for a hike.

Selfies in front of National Park signs always seem like the right thing to do in our ongoing attempt to capture us in front of all the National Parks of the United States, and a second shot is just incredibly lucky. Click here to see our visit back in July of 2004.

While I’m not 100% certain that we didn’t visit in between as I write this, our previous visit was possibly back in 2004 when, on July 3rd of that year, we arrived at Mt. Rainier under snow and clouds.

We are on the Comet and Christine Falls Trail, which is a 3.2-mile roundtrip hike that is rated as moderate with 1,279 feet of elevation gain.

At the time we crossed over this dandy log bridge, I took it for granted, but as I was researching details for this post, I saw that it’s broken and that for many people the end of the line for reaching the Comet Falls.

Caroline approaching Comet Falls on a perfect day.

There are so many beautiful views in this park on the trail that it’s difficult to share only those I’m posting but with my style of writing to each photo I include, I would only make my chore of writing impossible if I chose more.

I think visitors have been feeding the birds, probably at an alarming rate because since when do birds just fly up and land on your hands?

It’s so hard not to be compelled to take a hundred photos of the mountain that is notorious for being elusive.

Of course, a Junior Ranger badge was required. How else was Caroline going to know even more about this park?

With her ranger badge firmly pinned to her chest, it was time to celebrate with a toast of Rainier Beer under the shadow of Rainier.

Apparently, the foxes of Mt. Rainier also know the taste of human food. Do you think it prefers Oreo cookies or Cheetos?

Nope, I’m not getting bored of this view.

Sure, there are other views, and under normal circumstances, these layers of fading mountains in the distance would have been enough to stop for a photo, but come on, we’re at Mt. Rainier, and we’re not here to cheapen our memories. Oh wait, I’m sharing this suboptimal view into nothingness, but that’s okay, as whatever visually came after leaving the area is lost due to my failure to take more photos. In all likelihood, I skipped photos due to our 3.5-hour drive up north to Arlington, Washington, so we’d be well-positioned for tomorrow’s big adventure.