Western Washington in 200 photos

[icepixie]

Trip report and photos below! Thumbnails are clickable to a 1024x768 size (and if for some reason you want the full 4320x3240 size of any of these, just comment with the file name and I'll send it to you; this goes for any of my photos, BTW). If you prefer to view all the pictures at once, go to this Flickr set. I'll warn you that those captions

Comments

[fallingtowers]

Wow, this entire trip just looks absolutely amazing!

[icepixie]

It was indeed absolutely amazing!

[laserhead]

Bwahaha. That ID is really funny.

Looks like you had a great time! I was in Seattle for Thanksgiving, but the weather wasn't so glorious.

[icepixie]

I guess the ID was...the most sci-fi part of the show they could get, maybe, barring the actual gate itself?

We had a fabulous time. Yay vacation!

[castalianspring]

Lovely pictures! This just reinforces my desire to see that part of the country some day soon.

Penzey's Spices is a very dangerous place. I have one in my current city and I spend far too much money there.

[icepixie]

It's a great part of the country. Seriously, if not for the job thing and the weather thing, I'd be on the next plane over. I really liked the whole vibe of the place, the scenery, and all the stuff to do.

I'd never been to Penzey's before this trip! It was indeed quite tempting.

[icepixie]

That's okay! It's too bad our schedules didn't line up better, but at least we did get to meet up on the first day.

the best I can say about Lake 22 is that yeah, I had no idea it would be that snowy!

I was wondering, while we were hiking that part, if this was what you had warned me about. I was like, "Either this is way more snow than she implied, or she's way tougher than I thought." But we did see people going all the way up in sneakers, so we sort of figured it was just normal and we were being wimps.

Awww, barnacles sound so cute! I always thought they were smaller, though. Don't think I'd ever seen one IRL before this.

[icepixie]

It must have been over five feet, at the bare minimum, with drifts several feet higher. The rails on bridges like the one in the pictures usually come up to the bottom of my ribcage, which is 3.5 feet. It looks like the snow on the edges of the bridge is two feet higher than that. Plus I bet the "toilet" sign is about eye level for most people, so roughly five feet, and when I walked that way, I was definitely standing a couple feet above the sign. (This was where I fell through. I could tell I wasn't at the bottom; it was just that my other leg not falling through stopped me from going any further.)

And I thought the 2.5 feet we had at one point during my freshman year of college was a lot of snow.

When we hiked in Alaska the worst we got was ankle-deep

...I suddenly feel very tough!

Snow-hiking is a total pain.

Ugh, yes. I think I will avoid doing that again for the next...ever, really.

Hee, here's a picture of goose barnacles with their feet sticking out.

So cute!

[pezprez]

Really, really enjoyed your pictures and the stories of your escapades! Wish I could have been there (though if Zilla and I had been on that hike, we probably would have tried to tunnel out to the bridge). So glad you guys went and had a great time. I'm definitely curious to visit there someday, I've never been to that part of the country, but it looks incredible!

[icepixie]

We kept thinking you and Chandra would've loved that hike. ;)

You should definitely go to that part of the country someday--it's gorgeous. And you're a heck of a lot closer than we are. :D