The Flaming Geyser: You don't always get what you pay for.

My brother came up a few weekends ago to visit and we went to the Flaming Geyser State Park to explore. When we got to the gate where you had to pay to get in, we asked about the geysers. The park ranger said there was one and gave us directions on how to get there. When we found it, we knew he wasn't exaggerating when he said not to expect Old Faithful. I didn't really know what to expect, but it's basically a gas leak from the ground that they light and it burns continuously because of the gas leaking from the ground. Cool, but I don't know if it was $10 cool. George kindly footed the bill and we made the most of it, going on a little hike along the river and watching the kayakers, wondering how they don't tip over and wishing we could jump in the water--it was pretty toasty outside.

If we had thought ahead at all, we could've brought a picnic and a soccer ball or something, but as it was, all we brought were granola bars. Guess we could've used one of the open picnic tables to eat our granola bar picnic. :)

Here it is. THE Flaming Geyser.
As a side note, this park was really a nice place, but just not what we expected, I guess.

 After seeing the Flaming Geyser, we showed George around downtown Seattle. I don't have any pictures of that, though, but we got to see a fish thrown at Pike Place, ate at Red Robin on the pier, and were so glad that there was a hill to push the stroller up instead of only stairs to carry it up. (George and Michael were probably even more glad. I tried to help, but I think I probably just made it worse--I found all the stairs to climb on the way down. Ha. Sorry.) We ended the day with cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory. I was excited for George to try this stuff--mmmm, mmmm, good.

The next day we went to Mt. Rainier. We got to hike to Silver Falls and Grove of the Patriarchs. We did Silver Falls from the Grove of the Patriarchs' parking lot, which we've never done before. I think I liked it better, but it seemed much steeper, and I didn't even have to carry Darwin the whole way. Good thing Michael's so strong. :) It was so fun to have George around, as always! He's a hoot.

Mt. Rainier

Darwin liked the waterfall mist.

looking at Silver Falls