Olympic National Park (and Forest)

Today's main attraction was Olympic National Park, although we actually spent most of our day in Olympic National Forest and the pic below was actually taken near the end of our day.

Space Needle

Only two of us went to the observation deck, but they had a great time!

Seattle Monorail

We were excited to ride another monorail system on this road trip.  It was built for the 1962 World's Fair and continues to operate daily between two stations transporting people to and from the Space Needle.  This system was installed only 3 years after the system at Disneyland and both were built by Alweg.

For an added measure of fun, on both legs of our round trip, our guy got to honk the horn when leaving the station.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.

Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park

My navigator was adeptly able to replace Fort Vancouver with Klondike in our day's itinerary. Housed in a repurposed hotel from the Gold Rush days, the park did a nice job of providing a glimpse into live as a gold rush stampeder.

Entering Seattle

Our intended first stop of the day, Fort Vancouver, was scuttled due to 4th of July relater road closures and some rather rude traffic people.

On our way into Seattle we were greeted by the home of the Seahawks, CenturyLink Field.

Crater Lake National Park

Crater Lake it both gorgeous and has an awesome history.  For ten of thousand of years via countless eruptions, Mount Mazama was formed and peaked over over 14,000 feet.  An estimated 7,700 years ago, a massive eruption resulted in a total collapse of Mount Mazama when its magma cauldron was emptied in that eruption.

The resultant caldera became a beautiful lake with lush wildlife since that violent event that would have killed most, if not all, life within hundreds of mile. And since Crater Lake watershed consists only of snow melt and rain, its water are the bluest known to mankind.

Annual snow fall at the Lake averages over 40 feet per year.  This year's snow fall was atypically low at only 28 feet, but there were still some patches of snow within reach and other, larger snowbanks further from the rim trail.

The next two pics include Wizard Island.  of the several cones that formed after the collapse, Wizard Island is the only cone to clear the water level and is 2,400 feet high.

Crater Lake Lodge is one of the grand old lodges of the National Park Service.

Mount Shasta

Here is a picturesque, snow capped mountain (technically, its glacier capped with 7 permanent glaciers) on the drive up to Crater Lake.