Mount Rainer, Yakima, Grand Coulee (STR-2022-14)

Sunday, 26 June

With our 47-day caravan complete, Sprinty is back to independent adventuring. First up is exploring Washington state. In characteristic Sprinty fashion, as of this morning, he has a reservation for tonight, and 4th of July weekend - otherwise a clean slate for making up adventures on the fly.

Our travel leg for the day was 2.5 hours to Ike Kinswa State Park Campground on Mayfield Lake in Mossyrock, WA. After lingering at the KOA as long as permitted, we started meandering slowly, arriving at the state park an hour before check-in time. Fortunately, our site was ready, and we were able to get checked in and settled.

Oregon and Washington are under a heat advisory - experiencing high temperatures in the 90s. While that may be normal for this time of year in most of the country, it is apparently highly unusual for this area. We did a 2-mile hike through the campground loops, very pleased after being sick. As we walked along the shoreline, the lake was full of boaters, reminding us a lot of a weekend at Deep Creek Lake in Maryland.

Further review of our plans for the next couple of days found that relying on First Come-First Serve at the Cougar Rock campground at Mount Rainier National Park was probably overly optimistic. With well spaced, shaded sites at Ike Kinswa State Park Campground, we made reservations again for Monday night. Because one of the roads in Mount Rainier is closed due to flood damage, the overall driving is about the same.

Monday, 27 June

We left the campground about 8:30am and made our way to the Longmire Visitor Center. Mount Rainier kept playing peek-a-boo along our drive, making appearances where there was no place to safely pull Sprinty off for a photo.

We finally got a distant view from a safe place to pull off.

At the Longmire Visitor Center, we got a good view of Mount Rainier.

The Visitor Center had a number of exhibits on the geology of Mount Rainier. Several were of particular interest such as the "How a Volcano Works" exhibit describing how Mount Rainier was formed on the eroded surface of volcanic rock deposited during earlier periods of eruption.

While Mount Rainier is far from being the tallest mountain, it rises higher above its base than most major peaks of the globe. The summit of Mount Rainier is approximately 11,000 feet above its base. This fact gives it a commanding appearance rivaled by few peaks of the world.

As we drove up along the Nisqually River, Kris noticed how the water looked milky. We learned at the Visitor Center that this was the result of glacial flour, the tiny particles of rock ground up by glaciers.

As we continued up towards Paradise, we stopped at Christine Falls which was flowing beautifully right by the road.

With the warmer than normal temperatures, the hills seems to be flowing throughout the drive. Even small waterfalls were beautiful.

The pull off at Ricksecker Point provided a nice vantage point for Mount Rainier.

Narada Falls had a large pull off, and being still fairly early in the morning, we took advantage of being able to get Sprinty parked. Narada Falls is a 168-foot waterfall formed by the Paradise River plunging over a steep drop.

The volume and amount of water created quite a mist at the viewing point - fewer than 1 in 20 braved the mist to get the photo.

By the time we got to Paradise, the upper parking lot was full and the lower parking lot was filling up. Sprinty found a nice spot to view the mountain while his humans had lunch.

While visiting the Henry M Jackson Visitor Center at Paradise, we verified what roads were open in the Park. Like Glacier National Park, some roads are not cleared and opened until July.

Darrell then did a few short hikes from the Visitor Center, which were in snow. The first was to to a waterfalls, even though the Ranger said the falls were under snow. The hike provided another perspective on Mount Rainier.

The second hike was the Nisqually Vista hike, recommended by the Ranger.

With warmer than normal temperatures in the Pacific Northwest today, we chose to spend the rest of the afternoon at Paradise where we had cooler temperatures, a great view of the mountain and surprisingly, decent cellular signal.

We returned to Kinswa State Park Campground this time to a dry camping site located a little closer to the lake. The new site also had better cellular service, even though it was only a few hundred feet from last nights's site.

Tuesday, 28 June

We awoke to a beautiful morning. We prepared Sprinty for several days of dry camping by filling the fresh water tanks and dumping the black and gray tanks. First up though was to get back to golfing. With few choices in the area, we picked Maple Grove Golf, a nine-hole executive length course that was part of an RV park in Randle, WA. We elected to walk the course, in part to assess how we are recovering. We mostly had the course to ourselves, played at our pace, and struggled like we had not played for a couple of weeks. We both made some good shots and some boo-boos.

After golf, we made our way back to Mount Rainier National Park, this time to the east side. We made a brief stop at the Ohanapecosh Visitor Center to check on some trails to hike. We picked Silver Falls hike, starting at the Grove of the Patriarchs parking area, in part because other trailheads were small for Sprinty.

We enjoyed a nice hike along the Ohanapecosh River to Silver Falls, which was roaring with snow melt.

After the waterfall hike, we drove into the White River area in the hopes of a good view of Mount Rainier.  The road offered few views, and the few views it did offer were obscured with clouds.

Our campsite for the night is at Silver Springs Campground, a Mount Baker - Snoqualmie National Forest campground, near Enumclaw, WA. Sprinty picked a nice site under towering fir trees.

Wednesday, 29 June

After our stay in the tall forests of the Cascades, Sprinty headed east via the Chinook Pass. As he returned to Cayuse Pass at 4,694 feet elevation, he found himself in the clouds and surrounded by lingering snow. No magnificent vistas today.

Tipsoo Lake Pullout

The crest of Chinook Pass was at 5,432 feet and the ground was covered in snow. At the top of the pass, the temperature was in the upper 30s. At the pullout just below the pass, the snow was still over 10 feet deep.

Sprinty continued down the Mather Memorial Parkway (WA Highway 410), following the American River to Yakima, WA. As we descended in elevation, the forests started giving way to the brown, desert-like vegetation typical of eastern Washington and eastern Oregon.

Upon arrival on the outskirts of Yakima, we stopped in at SunTides Golf Course and the adjacent SunTides RV Park. We made a tee time for tomorrow, and arranged a campsite.

After getting Sprinty settled in his campsite, we took the eBikes out for a ride on the Yakima Greenway which ran right by the park. We enjoyed a nice, paved trail to the southeast side of Yakima, along the Naches and Yakima Rivers. We logged just over 20 miles.

Back at camp, we saw a vacant site with better afternoon shade being unoccupied, and made arrangements to change sites, and stay a second night. We combined a grocery and diesel errand with dinner from a gyro place in Yakima. Great gyro, and really friendly folks working there.

Thursday, 30 June

We reached an overnight low of 44 degrees, about 10 degrees lower than our arsenal of weather apps forecast. It made for some good sleeping. The commute to the golf course was just over 100 yards (a pitching wedge shot) from our campsite. We arrived early for our 9:20 tee time and were told we could go right off. The course was very flat, making it walkable. We both walked the first nine holes, struggling with the nice, fast greens. Kris got a cart for the second nine, while Darrell walked. We both played better than our last outing, so we were pretty pleased. The course had beautiful grass, the product of irrigated water from the Naches River, no doubt. A definite play again.

Friday, 1 July

Sprinty has been on this summer's adventure for two months. He has added four states camped in to his collection, and three National Parks. After two relaxing days in Yakima, he repositioned to Grand Coulee, WA for the Fourth of July weekend. Getting campsites on weekends requires planning, and the holiday weekend is just even more popular for camping.

We chose to follow Canyon Road (WA Highway 823) which ran along the Yakima River to Ellensburg, WA. As we left Yakima, we saw Mount Rainier in the distance.

Mount Rainier

We enjoyed a scenic drive and virtually no traffic. The terrain, river and vegetation reminded us of driving along the Colorado River east of Moab.

After Ellensburg, we continued to Leavenworth, WA, a Bavarian-themed town like Helen, GA. Arriving early got us a place to park Sprinty while we wandered through the town. Several shops weren't even open yet at 10:30.

By the time we left at 11:15, the parking lot was full. After Leavenworth, we turned east on US 2 to Dry Falls State Park. The cliffs are skeletal remnants of what was once the world's largest waterfall.

At 3-1/2 miles long and 350 feet high, Dry Falls would dwarf Niagara Falls.

It is hard to envision the magnitude of the falls - fortunately, the Visitor Center and other interpretive signs told the story of Dry Falls. 

During the ice age, glaciers to the north blocked the Columbia River and forced it to find a new route.  The river, swollen from melting glacial ice, began to carve a new channel here.  But that was only the beginning.

A river in Idaho found no way around its ice dam. The river filled its valley with a huge lake that flooded many square miles of Montana - until the ice dam broke. With a flow up to ten times the combined flow of all the rivers of the world, the lake emptied across Idaho into eastern Washington. Much of the water rushed through the new channel opened by the Columbia River. The turbulent water enlarged the channel and created huge waterfalls. Eastern Washington was scoured by many such floods, each lasting only a few weeks.

When the last flood subsided, large areas of eastern Washington were left scarred with channels called coulees. This one, the Grand Coulee, is the largest. Cutting across the coulee is Dry Falls. This 3-1/2 mile wide and over 400-foot tall group of scalloped cliffs was at one time the largest waterfall in the world.

We continued north, stopping to check out Baker Lake Golf Course for possibly playing this weekend. Then to Grand Coulee Dam to locate the visitor center and where the dam tours were conducted for tomorrow.

Our campsite for the night is at Spring Canyon Campground - Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area. Being a holiday weekend, Sprinty had to cobble together three different sites for three nights. As the campground has no hookups, changing sites is even easier. The campground was filled with families enjoying the Fourth of July weekend. We walked down to the beach area - it was quite large, with a very large day use parking lot. With temperatures in the 80s, swimming in the lake was quite popular.

Saturday, 2 July

We started our activities with the Grand Coulee Dam tour (www.usbr.gov/pn/grandcoulee/visit/tour.html). Tours are available on a first-come, first-served basis, at 10 a.m., 12 p.m., 2 p.m., and 3:30 p.m. PDT, running approximately one hour. We arrived early to make sure we could get Sprinty parked in the small-ish parking lot and get on the first tour.

After a security briefing and screening, we got into the vans which took us to the pump-generating plant. The pump-generating plat consists of 12 pumps that pump water through 12 pens rocks to a man made impoundment called Banks Lake.

Six of the pumps are pump-generators, meaning they can pump water up to Banks Lake, or be used to draw water from Banks Lake to make electricity.

The 27-mile long Banks Lake is the major reservoir for the Columbia Basin Project, which utilizes the Grand Coulee Dam to supply irrigation water to 10,000 farms on 671,000 acres of farmland in the Columbia River Basin. Banks Lake is filled by the Grand Coulee Dam pumps pumping water from the Columbia River. The irrigation transformed the region from a dry, arid landscape (average rainfall of 6 to 10 inches a year) to a major agriculture region.

The tour took us out on the dam where we got out to take pictures and ask questions.

The Grand Coulee Dam created Lake Roosevelt, which extends 133 miles, almost to the Canadian border.

Looking Upstream at Lake Roosevelt

Looking Downstream

After the dam tour, we went to the Visitor Center. We started with the videos. The Man-made Marvel video portrayed the building of the dam during the Depression. With the outbreak of World War II, producing power became the priority, placing the irrigation aspect on hold until 1951.

The Desert Garden video portrayed how water from the Columbia was used to irrigate an area roughly the size of Rhode Island.

The Great Floods video explained how the coulees and the Columbia River Basin was carved by glacial floods 12,500 to 15,000 years ago. We were glad we visited Dry Falls yesterday so we could get a better appreciation of the glacial origins.

As we drove to Grand Coulee yesterday, we saw a number of huge boulders in the agricultural fields - clearly out of place. The Great Flood video explained how these huge boulders were moved via the flood waters, some floating in icebergs.

With the completion of the Third Power Plant in 1980, Grand Coulee Dam became the largest hydropower generating facility in the world. It is currently the eighth largest in the world. With a 6,809-megawatt generating capacity, supplying up to 17 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, Grand Coulee is the nation's largest power station.

Grand Coulee Dam also provides three other major benefits: flood control, jobs (500 jobs in an area which has a population of about 3,000), and recreation and tourism.

After the Visitor Center, we drove up to Crown Point Vista which provides a commanding view of Grand Coulee Dam

With rain in the forecast for tomorrow, we moved up our plan to play golf. We played Banks Lake Golf & Country Club in Electric City, WA. An 18 hole course, it was in fair condition. Darrell struggled with hitting long drives outside the fairways, losing several balls. Kris mostly kept her drives in the fairways. A hot day for this region, we were surprised at how few people were playing golf on a holiday weekend. We almost had the course all to ourselves.

We went back to Spring Canyon Campground to checkin as we are in a different site than last night.

After dinner, we made our way back to the Grand Coulee Dam Visitor Center for the nightly laser light show at 10pm (www.usbr.gov/pn/grandcoulee/visit/laser.html). 

Our dam tour guide had told us where to view the laser show, and said that the show likely would not be very crowded. Sprinty got a front row spot.

At about 9:45pm, they started opening the spillway gates which turned the spillway white with water flowing down the surface.

The show started at 10pm. Using the laser light and narration, the show told the story of Grand Coulee Dam.

Arriving back at the campground at 11pm, we were pleased to be in the site we are in - it was an easy pull-in that had the least disruption to other campers arriving so late. Moments after Sprinty pulled into his site, a mini-squall hit with wind gusts easily 40+ mph. Sprinty rocked and rolled a bit, and his humans kept an ear out for the many tent campers who were getting blown around. The family next to us relocated their pickup to block the wind from blowing over their tent. All seemed to have fared okay - and it brought back memories of the decades of tent camping we used to do.