The Unexpected

Day 13. Sunday, May 3.


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So. That happened. I promised Niko I wouldn't go into the embarrassing details, but let's just say he developed an infection on his... uh... booty. We first noticed it on the waterfall hikes the day before and decided to keep an eye on it. In the night, it... got worser. So first thing in the morning on lucky day 13, we were looking for a vet open on Sundays.

We were lucky enough to find a great 24 hour hospital in Vancouver, WA about 30 minutes away. And 3 hours and $200 later, Niko was drugged and wearing a lampshade on his head. Good times.

After the excitement of the day, we loaded back in Harvey and drove to Mt Rainier National Park. The park gets a lot of late season snow, so no campgrounds were open yet, but we had reserved a site just outside the park entrance. Before checking in, we went into the park about 6 miles to Longmire. The snow was surprisingly high at only 2,700 ft. We got out and walked around a bit, but the trails were all snow covered and the mountain covered in clouds. But were were standing on the edge of a meadow with some bubbling soda spring when the clouds parted just enough for some quick looks at the impressive mountain.






Afterward we went back out our campground, run by a very friendly man named Craig. The campground was very charming during the day, but drifted toward down right creepy at night. But Casey was brave. So very, very brave. And didn't freak at all.