And so the adventure begins....

Here we are packed cozily into our room in Packwood, Washington. It is 1:15 am East Coast time, we have been up since 3:15 this morning. Excuse me if this is brief, but I am tired! Chuck picked us up this morning at 4 to go to the airport. John and Jimmy flew US Air to Seattle via Charlotte and Alexa, Peter and I flew Southwest via Houston. Our flights left at roughly the same time from Orlando and we arrived 3 minutes apart in Seattle! Both legs of our flight were awesome - no turbulence! Peter thought takeoff was a bit like Star Tours at Hollywood Studios (not sure the pilots would be complimented by that...) but his favorite part was landing. When we arrived, John and Jimmy met us at the baggage claim and we were off - the airport was clockwork - we were off to a great start! Then we get to the rental car counter - their computers were down so things were taking  'a little' longer than usual. We left the airport before 12:30, but did not have a car until after 2! We have a Grand Caravan, I really like the way it drives and it only took 4 or 5 arrangements of the suitcases to fit everything in.   This area is gorgeous - with the majestic pine trees and the rolling hills surrounded by snow capped mountains. The weather was in the 70s and it was a beautiful, clear day. We did manage to bring the heat with us - tomorrow is supposed to get to 93 - we are told it never gets that warm here! Back to the day - our first stop was Shakey's for lunch? dinner? it was 2:30 here, 5:30 east coast...... Shakey's is not a delicacy that can be found in the east so we have to get it whenever we can.We went from there to the check out the Chambers Bay Golf Course, site of the 2015 US Open. Wow, what amazing views! We stood on top of a bluff looking out to Puget Sound with the golf course nestled below. After that it was on to Olympia and the State Capitol. We decided that we were tired and it would be better to go to Mt. Rainier Natl Park tomorrow rather than try to squeeze it in late in the day when everyone just wanted to get to the hotel and SLEEP! From Olympia, we had about an hour and 45 minute drive to get here to the hotel. We were just about to get off the highway (a large highway - Interstate 5) when we noticed that there was a deer running around in the middle of the road. It was acting crazy and charged right for the car. John did some quick maneuvering and managed to avoid a collision, but it was close. After the highway, there was about 60 miles of scenic one-lane road. There were deer everywhere! The most striking thing about that drive was Mt. Rainier and Mt. St. Helens towering over everything else. I guess I always pictured them as another peak in a tall range, but that is not really the case. They kind of stick up in the middle of nowhere. I hope to get some good pictures tomorrow. As for now, I am sleep typing. I will work on fixing up the setup of the blog (like previous year's links, etc. in the next couple of days).We'll keep you posted.