Move to Mt. Vernon
Our original plan was to return to Mt. Rainier for 9 days, but the campsite mix-up eliminated that possibility. Luckily, we were able to find a campground in Mt. Vernon that had available campsites for the 9 days we needed. We stayed in Mt. Vernon on the way to Canada a number of years ago. Dinner at the Chinese restaurant across the street from the Best Western made it a memorable stay. So when we started looking for places to look for campsites, we remembered Mt. Vernon. Mt. Vernon is also a good base for exploring the North Cascades and Mt. Baker.
We slept in today and took our time getting things ready to leave. It was only a 60-mile drive from our Lake Pleasant campsite to Mt. Vernon RV Park, and we wanted to make sure our new campsite would be vacated. The campground seems very "laid back." They don't even have a handout or a map to give incoming campers. The guy in the office walked out the door and pointed to our campsite. There are lots of big rigs here, with Phaetons on 3 sides of us.
We were on the Internet most of the afternoon looking for things to do in the area. There are three relatively small fires on three sides of this area, and a layer of smoke hangs in the air any time you look toward the horizon. One of our main reasons for coming up here was to shoot the Perseid meteor shower on Sunday and/or Monday morning from Mt. Baker. You'll never guess the two days it is forecast to rain. Yep, Sunday and Monday. Trying to shoot stars and meteors in the rain doesn't sound very promising. We just can't get a break with the weather on this trip.
We decided to drown our sorrows in Chinese food and went to the restaurant we liked so much last time we were up here. I don't know if we over-hyped the restaurant for ourselves, but the food was nothing spectacular. It was OK, but not as good as Chopsticks Inn at home. We may try it again and try other entrees this time.
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