Cascade Bike Ride & Campground "Check-Out"

On Saturday, we decided to drive to and check out a campground in North Cascades National Park in which we are hoping to camp in the park for a few nights.  There are no electrical, water or sewer hookups so we will be roughing it for a few days.   :)

As we drove east on Hwy 20, we could see the Cascades peaks in the distance and the Skagit River to our south.

We drove through the towns of Concrete, Rockport, and Marblemount before arriving at Cascades National Park which has the prettiest National Park entrance sign we have seen yet.

 

The entrance sign is made to look like a mountain with a glacier on top and a creek below.

 

It even has a place for you to set your camera for self-timed pictures,

 

which of course we had to try out.

 

We made several loops in the campground and found a couple of different sites that we think will work.  We'll let you know tomorrow!  :)

We stopped at a little restaurant just outside the KOA where we are staying and had a very good hamburger for a late lunch.  Chuck tried something new with his onion rings:  tartar sauce.  Apparently, that's what a lot of people ask for with their onion rings around here.  He said it was pretty good but he thought he would rather have ketchup.  I bet it was not as good as the honey and onion rings I had in Newfoundland last summer.  :)

After we got back to the camper, we decided to go for a bike ride on the Cascade Trail which was also very near the KOA.  The Cascade Trail is 22.5 miles running from Sedro-Woolley to Concrete, WA, and runs along the old abandoned Burlington Northern railroad.  The trail was a hard-packed gravel trail with a slight elevation gain.

 

There were several mossy-covered trees...

 

...and lots of shade. 

 

In some places, we rode between rocks that had been blasted through when the railroad had been constructed many, many years ago.  Look at how big this root was growing down from this cedar tree in the rock.  The root was as big as the tree!  If all cedar trees are anchored this well to the rock bluffs we sometimes see on the sides of mountains, it's easy to see why they rarely fall over.

 

We rode behind Challenger Ridge Winery...

...and then turned around at what we thought was 5 miles...

...and headed back to the KOA.

 

When we got back to the campground, Chuck's bike odometer was showing we had only ridden 9 miles.  Since our goal was to ride 10 miles, we rode around the campground and on the road a little more to get our 10 miles in.

That evening, we sat outside for awhile and watched all the kids playing in a nearby field.  This campground has lots of kids which is good.  Kids and camping go GREAT together!