A non-Rainier weekend

I mentioned a few days ago how I was so disproportionally, disingenuously excited about hiking on Mt Rainier. I showed a picture (courtesy of bing images) of the glorious views I fully expected to greet us.

I failed to take into account, however, as I inevitably always do when I travel to Seattle, that it might rain. That it might downpour steadily, unremorsefully, all day. And that, dear folks, pretty much sums up our Lewis and Clark escapade in the Cascades. It would have all been a lost and futile weekend, had it not been for the cos and her lovely fam.

Super troopers that they are, they decided to join us for the first night of camping down in Longmire, little critter in tow and all. I could barely believe it, but there he was, their little baby, barely a year old, still proudly displaying the dimples in his knees and elbows. And already learning the joys of camping. After a cosy evening warming ourselves around the campfire (my Cos' hubby made curry, and not the freeze-dried kind nuther!), we retired early to our tents, in preparation for the long day of hiking ahead of us.

Delta and I woke early the next morning, but the rain had already got a head start on us. Sipping our steaming mugs of coffee silently, each of us hoped it was just a passing shower typical of the Seattle area. Despite the Cos' exhortations to abandon our hiking plans and return back home with them, we decided to press on. After all, we'd come all the way from New York for this very experience, and here we were on Mt Rainier. We were hardly going to give up at the very onset.

And so we set off, up the mountain. Thirty pounds on the back. Rain, rain, rain. Up, up, up. Pretty soon, the friendly drizzle had turned into an outright deluge, and everything we had with us, including our spirits and souls, were soaked through. Finally, some three hours into the hike, we reached a point when I started shivering uncontrollably, and Delta brought us to a stop.

"We have to turn around," he told me firmly, "we'll die of hypothermia here in the mountains otherwise."

And just as we'd made the decision to turn around, we came upon a forest ranger. "I'm just advising everyone to turn around and leave the mountain," she told us, "there's some pretty large thunderstorms rolling in that could be dangerous."

And that, right there, was the end of our Mt Rainier non-adventure. Soaked through and shivering, miserable and unaccomplished, and without yet so much as a glimpse of the mountain itself. Inevitably, I was disappointed and disheartened as we stomped our way back down the mountain.

But just there at the entrance of the park, we pulled over into a little cafe and had some homemade hot chocolate - and, well, it's remarkable how little it sometimes takes to make things feel all better again.

It might have been a failure mission all around, except that we headed back to the Cos' house in Seattle, to be greeted by a smiling family, hot showers, and a warm hearth. :Make yourself at home," her hubby said after we'd laughingly related our tale, "and we'll order in some thai food for din." Nothing like some nosh to heal the soul.

And so we got to spend the entire weekend with my Cos and her family. And really see how much their little son had grown. How he was about to utter his first words, and walk his first steps. Watched him grip our fingers in his little hands, giggling and babbling in excitement. Crawling speedily behind the dog and cat.

All in all, a wonderful weekend. Far better than a weekend on Rainer after all.