Glamping in the Pacific NW Autumn Beauty

 

Below the clouds in Mt. Rainer NP

If you time it right, New England has its beautiful red autumns and Colorado has its golden aspens.  And with good timing, Oregon and Washington can be a fall color delight of red, orange, yellow and coniferous greens.  We lucked out this year with a September Central Oregon Airstream rally and an October Washington State road trip.  

View of Mt. Jefferson from the 8-mile perimeter loop

Smith Rocks State Park in Central Oregon never disappoints.  The rocks change color by the hour, season, and hiking route.  We camped nearby at Cove Palisades State Park in late September with fellow Airstreamers over a long weekend.  Daughter Feruza from New York scored a dirt-cheap ticket and joined us.  It was so nice to hang with her and see Airstream friends we haven’t seen in over a year.  

 

Smith Rocks and Crooked River

Cycling the Rim Overlook above Lake Billy Chinook 

We love to travel in the autumn, and this year was no different.  Home from the UK for just a month, we got antsy for a road trip and decided on some new and familiar places in Washington State.  (Thanks, Tim and Pam for the inspiration!).  So, without an itinerary we headed north and took it day by day. The weather was cool and sometimes rainy, but the colors were near perfect--especially when we couldn't safely pull over to take a photo of them. 

In retrospect, we stayed farther west than on past trips

 

Glamping in Morton's city park,
a good base camp to explore Mt. Rainer. 

The new part of this trip was the White Pass after Mt. Rainier NP, the Yakima River Gorge, Leavenworth, and the Olympic coast.  We skipped Lake Chelan and Bonneville Dam because we have been there, but I highly encourage reading our 2014 posts about them, as they are truly worth a visit.  (Lake Chelan) (Bonneville Dam)

Close your eyes and imagine you're seeing
Mt. Rainer in the 35 degree fog

We found Leavenworth to be too touristy for our taste, but we loved hiking the Icicle River Gorge and the surrounding countryside. 

The road to the Icicle Gorge trailhead

Pearrygin Lake State Park 

North Cascades National Park was beautiful, but as with our last trip, the weather wasn’t.  Thus, no extra nights or hikes as we had hoped.  But we had a nice night camping near the Skagit River in the Sedro-Wooley city park with hookups and a good cell connection to stream shows we missed.

 

Climbing to the 5400' Washington Pass
in North Cascades NP 

To the sunset, just before the storm

Other than a memorable 2005 backpack trip with my brother and nephew on the Olympic Coast, we hadn’t been to the Olympic Peninsula in over two decades.  We couldn’t believe the sprawl from Sequim to Port Angeles.  Or the many speeding log trucks.  That said, it was beautiful in the rain as Hwy 101 took us out of Port Angeles toward the coast winding through Indian reservations and Olympic National Park.  We enjoyed a cozy night as a coastal storm battered the trailer.

The Columbia, looking west.

 This year marks our 10^th year of owning an Airstream. So, as we headed toward home, we thought it was only appropriate to camp in Skamokawa County Park on the Columbia River, the site of our first Airstream Rally.  It was the last place Lewis Clark camped in 1805 before sighting the Pacific Ocean.  Compared to last summer, camping is now sociable again with friendly neighbors. 

 

As with all trips for us, it’s good to go and very good to be back home again.  You can see more photos of these trips on my  Facebook page.  We wish you a colorful autumn as Thanksgiving approaches.  

“What We Can, While We Can!”

Afternoon view from our deck

Morning double rainbow surprise