“Who cooks for you, who cooks for you all?“

That’s the sound I was greeted with this morning at Seaquest State Park near Castle Rock. Love a barred owl!

We left Rainbow Falls yesterday, headed for Lewis and Clark State Park after a quick stop at Walmart for a meat thermometer and a few other necessities. After pulling through Lewis and Clark we decided to move along. Fairly unappealing from our vantage point.

We’ve found many differences between these parks so far. They care if you arrive before check-in or they don’t. The offices are open and staffed or they aren’t. The yellow phones work or they don’t. You can make reservations or you can’t. Park facilities are in fine fettle or they aren’t. All in all, though, it’s been good, and fun to visit places we’ve never experienced.

I will say this, Rainbow “Falls” is a bit of a stretch:

Nice old growth, a very good dinner, and some cows who were convinced we had something to offer them:

We arrived at Seaquest a day early and luckily the spot we have reserved for the weekend was open. We took a quick bike ride across the highway (there’s a tunnel, yay!) to the Mt. St. Helens Visitor Center. Very nice, and we’ll tour the museum this weekend. The boardwalk through the wetlands is fantastic; lily pads, birds, and bullfrogs! (Love that sound too!) Great views of the mountain.

Looking forward to Caleb, Leslie, Mac, and Ren arriving tomorrow.