September ’23

This year the annual Vintage Trailer Rally for our area was held at Elkamp in Mineral, WA at the foot of Mt Rainier. (https://www.elkamp.com/) This is possibly the prettiest campground I’ve ever stayed in.

Dave was busy doing something at home for this trip, but since I had such a successful trip last summer by myself, I decided to go it alone again. Just me and my Airstream, heading up into the wilderness!

It was actually much closer to home than last summer’s solo trip, and the weather was beautiful. I had no problem at all. I did need a little help getting backed into my spot though. Luckily there are always friends around to help at a VAC rally.

What a beautiful, peaceful spot!

This spot was super secluded and peaceful!

Navi stayed home, but since Dave was busy all weekend, she stayed with Sherry, who sent me updates 😀

Navi was much happier being at home than being stuck on a trailer trip!

The next day I headed into the nearby town of Elbe to see what was up. This row of colorful Cabooses was a hotel!

And this is a cool old church. Neat history plaque included.

I headed on up to Mt Rainier National Park. Got to tick another National Park off my list since I’m so close. There were so many people there I couldn’t even get close to the visitor’s center and museum. Maybe next time. I had to settle for pretty viewpoints.

On the way back down I stopped for lunch at a Nepalese resteraunt. My coworkers are in Nepal, so I had to stop and try it. The food was delicious! The best beef stew I’ve ever had!

The owner was a Sherpa who had been to the top of Everest, set a world record for how fast he did it, and ‘retired’ to lead people up Mt Rainier instead.

Very cool! I wish I’d had room for pie. I’ll definitly try to get Dave up there this summer. (https://mt-rainier.com/vendor/wildberry-restaurant/)

Back at the rally I relaxed the rest of the afternoon until happy hour. Everything in the trailer was working, and it was such a wonderful place to crash and read a book, listening to the birds and chipmunks.

The next day I took a walk around the camp. It’s really pretty. I thought I was lost for a bit, but I came right back out in the campground.

Then I grabbed my rod and headed out to find some fishing. There was a lake nearby that I heard was pretty dry, since it was the end of summer, but I heard Mineral Lake was a good choice.

When I got there I had a nice time chatting with a couple from Puyallup who were hanging out by the water. We were talking fishing, and I caught a little baby bass, but that was about all. There were a bunch of ducks getting in the way, including this one with a striking red head.

I went to grab something out of my car, and came back and there was a lady taking pictures of it. I said ‘weird looking duck, eh?’ and she said ‘yeah, I read about it in the paper and just had to come take pictures of it!’. In the paper? ‘Yeah, there was an article about it being here!’ and I thought, wow, that is some slow news day. Good for them!

After that I drove up the road a ways to get a view of Mt Rainier over the lake. You couldn’t see it from the boat launch, but it was beautiful right up the road.

So that was a really nice rally. Elkamp is beautiful, and Mt Rainier is beautiful. I’ll definitely go there again when I have a chance!