Where: North Cascades National Park, 2.5 hr from Seattle
My sisters were coming in town and my husband had the weekend off so we searched the state and saw were it would be least likely to rain (per usual) and saw that the north cascades looked good, for at least Saturday. So we packed up the car (4 humans + pup) and headed north Friday night. Dorris, Cody and Catherine also met us Friday night. We got there about 9 and tried to find a campsite to set up in in the dark. The great thing about fall camping is lots of open sights and no fees! The downside is setting up in the rain.. We bought the Kelty tarp just a few days prior looking at the forecast. We set it up over our tent to let us set up our tent without getting everything wet, which worked great. We all went to bed early as sitting up in the rain is no fun.
Saturday we awoke and made pancakes and bacon! Ahh the luxuries of car camping. 3 more people joined us this morning to come with for the hike. After breakfast we all got on the road to Thunder Knob trail. This hike is 3.5 miles and 635 elevation gain. We wanted a short hike we could do with all the sight seeing. The bridge that is normally there to cross a river is taken down in the winter, so we had to cross a sketchy log. We all made it across fine on the way there, but on the way back my foot fell off and into the water.. the worst! Anyways, the hike was easy peasy with great views to boot. At the top you see grand views of Diablo Lake. After the hike we made our way to the Diablo Lake overlook and took in the magnificent sights. This lake is phenomenal. I want to go back and explore so much more of the north cascades.
After that we made quesadillas, s'mores. and enjoyed a fire. No rain all day! It rained a little bit during the night, but we woke up to no rain again. Sometimes you endure the weather to reap the benefits. Sometimes it's worth it. Sometimes it's not. This time it definitely was.