Tall Chief RV Park Washington State - Snoqualmie Falls - 2022/07/29-08/09

It's no big secret that I'm falling behind in getting these written up. Here it is almost the end of October and I'm just getting around to writing up the end of July. So, in a push to catch up, I'll be rushing through things a little bit. A little less writing, more pictures. And sometimes 2-3 posts a day if I can keep up. Let's jump right into it. 

Seaside Oregon was beautiful but it's time to leave and head further north. 

Our journey today is taking us further north into Washington State, close to Seattle. 

Goodbye Seaside! We had a great time here! 

Driving over to the Lewis & Clark Bridge. I told the kids it was named for the famous explorer Dr. Albert Bridge (a play on the Jungle Cruise Schweitzer Falls joke). 

Entering Washington. No frills with the sign, just like all the other times we've entered. 

And by the way, to all the kids who are playing the license plate game in the car (do they still do that?), you're welcome! We brought our Florida truck all the way up here to Washington!

We get to choose our own spot here at the Tall Chief RV Park. Many of them are labeled for rigs only a certain size or longer, which is nice. Our spot was nestled between a lot of trees. Luckily it was clear backing in and the roads were wide enough to maneuver. 

One of the things the kids and I have been working for for a few months now is getting an all gold kart on Mario Kart. Some of the challenges aren't too hard, but others (like beating all the staff ghosts) can be difficult and take lots of tries. 

Today we finally did it! You can see how super excited they are! The all-gold kart isn't actually any better than the ones that are normally in the game, but it was a fun goal to work to. All of us contributed too!

The kids are so creative! For my birthday, they made games in their room for us to play. 

Knock down the characters from the ladder. 

Drop the eraser and win the tickets that it's pointing at. Or spin the wheel and whatever is closest to the eraser you win. 

And they had pictures and stories that they wrote as prizes!

We always like to walk around and explore the campgrounds. This one has a lot of places to walk! And what's this? 

Oh my goodness! We were trying to hard to find berries in Seaside! They are all over the place here! We picked a few, but we'll be back!

The kids liked that there was a playground. 

I thought our campsite had a bit of an Endor Moon (from Star Wars: Return of the Jedi) feel to it. 

We thought we'd get some hiking in, so we drove up the street to Snoqualmie Falls. Luckily I was able to find parking for the Beast. 

A short walk from the parking lot and there it was!

Smile!

So this is actually part of a hydroelectric dam system? And there's a hiking path down to the river to see it? Let's check it out!

I saw on a sign that the power companies have to clear the trees in the area for the power lines to run through. But after they clear the trees, they replant shrubs and other low growing vegetation to keep trees from re-growing in that area. They try to plant native species, in this case like berry bushes, to give the animals in the area a treat. Smart!

These trees growing out of the trunks of other trees were wild!

Thimbleberry? 

Theresa found a few. They do look like thimbles, don't they. We tried it and it had a bit of a raspberry flavor. 

Made it to the water! 

The kids love to climb all on the rocks. 

And so we all took our shoes off to climb together. 

Made it out into the river. 

Ah, looking towards the hydroelectric power plant. 

And the large pipes that divert water from the river upstream to turn the large turbines that generate electricity. 

There's a small walkway that leads over to the river giving another view of the falls. 

Pretty!

There's so much more to do here! We'll get into it soon!