Trip Round the Cascade Loop--also known as "What are we crazy?!"

Despite the inherent challenges involved with road-tripping with a toddler, we set out Friday for a trip around the Cascade Loop. We saw some beautiful country... Did some fun things... And Carolyn did, pretty well--except for the not sleeping part.

You can see from the photos we had a good time. Some funny moments: One of the goats at the fruit-stand petting zoo we visited was an escape artist. He was a tiny little guy and he would bend down and put his front hooves through the hole in his fence, shimmy his head through, and then step his back legs through. He seemed to especially like visiting the Llamas.


We stayed in a neat little hotel (Which I unfortunately did not get a photo of). It was right across the street from a beautiful river-walk in Chelan. The hotel was owned by a retired Submarine Commander who checked us in and chatted with Andy about general Navy things. The highlight for Andy: He was served breakfast by a sub commander. And it was a GOOD breakfast.

As we made our way up the river, we decided we wanted to stop and splash in the water some. We thought we found a good place to do so, though I wasn't too thrilled about the boulders (ok... just rocks) we had to climb over. We made our way down to a nice shallow place and noticed two things: One the piece of soap on a rock that I photographed--how quaint. Two--a terrible stench.... Further investigation revealed that some large salmon had come to an unfortunate end there on the riverbank. Did I mention that I was already feeling a little sick to my stomach? Andy, true pioneer that he was, tried to convince himself that it was a natural thing, and so we should be brave and do this anyway, but enough hesitation from me, and the power of the stench brought him to his senses, and we decided it wasn't time for us to splash.

Near the end of our journey we stopped for malts at a little drive-in restaurant. There we looked up to see a beautiful rainbow and at the end of it not a pot of gold, or skittles, but a mama doe with two little fawns playing in a lane across the way.

Carolyn, in case you were wondering, was a trooper. She had some fun walking the trails with us, playing in the riverside park, looking at ducks (which is one of her new words), and petting the goats at the petting zoo, so it wasn't a total hardship for her. ;) As I said--she did pretty well, except for the not-sleeping part.

So thus ends the summary of our trip round the Cascade Loop. Enjoy the photos!