The North Cascades

After our second night in Winthrop we spent the day driving through the North Cascades on our way home.  It was a beautiful drive and we were really looking forward to exploring.  However, I failed to read as much as I needed to about where the fires had been over the summer and so when we got out to go hike we found the trails were closed... So, unfortunately we did not get to do a big hike but we still saw some beautiful scenery and made the most of the drive.

Our first stop was at Washington Pass, which was gorgeous.  The pictures do not do it justice for how beautiful it was there.

It was a small little walk around at the pass that let you see it from many different vantage points.

We got lucky and had really nice weather for the first half of our day.

This was really pretty with the combination of some fall colors and some evergreens.

These photos are from our next stop when we tried to go hiking near the North Cascades National Park Visitors Center.  We got both of our kids out of the car and ready to go hiking and then walked a 1/10 of a mile to see a view point.  The longer trail that we wanted to hike on was closed off because of recent fires.  We were disappointed that the trails weren't open but at least we know the park service is trying to keep people safe.

We backtracked to a little town right before the visitors center so that we could get out and walk around a little before continuing our drive.  Alden wanted to play with these balls and didn't realize that they were stuck until after he tried to pull them out.

We thought we would go check out this bridge near the town but it was also closed off because of the recent fires.  So, we just looked at the bridge.

The area in the park was very beautiful, even if we did not see as much as we would have liked.

There was a train in the middle of the town that Alden had fun walking around with Daddy.

Anders and I relaxed and watched them walk around and explore a little.

Alden was pretty excited when he figured out that he could make the bell on the train ring.  I was glad that we were able to find something exciting for him to do.