Sam had another action packed day planned for Tuesday, starting with the short drive up to the Mount Rainier Gondola – a tiny misnomer considering it actually climbs Crystal Mountain – which then affords a stunning view of Mt Rainier amongst others.

Bodhi had never been on a gondola before and he looked somewhat apprehensive as we set off but was soon waving at the oncoming (mostly empty) gondolas.

The vista at the top was breathtaking…. bright blue skies, a comfortable temperature in the low twenties and plenty of fellow tourists enjoying it all.

Rainier was of course the star but Sam pointed out many other peaks including the infamous Mount St Helens which erupted as recently as 1980 killing 57 people and then experienced continuous volcanic activity until 2008. It is expected to erupt again and geologists predict that future eruptions will be destructive.

We had a quick bite to eat before making the most of photo opportunities in all directions.

Bodhi was much braver on the gondola descent but somewhat less impressed with being loaded into the car again, fortunately it was only a short drive to the subalpine Tipsoo Lake set in a glacier-carved basin amid spectacular wildflower meadows.

This is really Washington with her best summer clothes on, such a contrast to my last visit. After completing the loop around the lake we headed for home and a planned early night.

I could not contain my excitement though when we had an unexpected visitor in the form of an American “trash panda” or to us Aussies, a cute raccoon 😍 Seeing a live raccoon (as opposed to road kill) has been on my bucket list for awhile…

She first appeared peeking over the decking and then got more courageous until she was basically having a face off with Bodhi who was equally fascinated.

After dinner we went for a short stroll where we discovered the whole family including at least two ‘kits’ so I practiced trying to improve my new camera skills in low light with fast moving subjects!

The next morning whilst packing up we had some more local visitors who were more interested in checking out what we had put into the bin than the visiting humans.

On the road by nine we were back in Seattle in time for lunch after an action packed short break which only whetted our appetite for more mountain visits in the future!

We’ve been in Seattle just over a week, long enough to reset our body clocks to the Northern Hemisphere and noticing that it takes a bit longer these days 😉

After attending Johnny’s wedding down in Oregon last weekend, (38C but fabulous) Sam suggested a short break to show us ‘his’ mountains and specifically Mt Rainier.

At 4,392m Mt Rainier is the tallest mountain in Washington state and the Cascade Range. We’ve seen it several times before from the air as it stands out prominently from the surrounding topography and is visible from Seattle and on a clear day even from Vancouver, Canada. It is an active volcano and considered to have a high chance of eruption in the ‘near’ future. We had a quick stop for lunch beside the river which Bodhi was a little too intent on exploring so were soon on our way again.

The temperature had dropped back to the high twenties and an azure sky created a beautiful contrast to the verdant meadows dotted with wildflowers.

We decided on the ‘moderate’ hike up to Sourdough Ridge, a trail which eventually continues on to Frozen Lake. The views at the ridge of Rainier in one direction and Mt Baker in the other were spectacular and we could see the lake in the distance as well as a kaleidoscope of colourful wildflowers in the foreground.

At around about this point the youngest member of the family was starting to let us know we’d probably done enough for today and coupled with some ferocious mountain mosquito action we decided to call it a day and headed down the mountain to find our air BnB, crank up the hot tub and fire up the barbie 😍