Where: Mount Rainier National Park, WA, U.S.A. (Paradise area)
When: September 2006 and June 2009
How: ~ 2.5 hours or 120 miles from Seattle south-eastward.
Things we did: Day trip: Hiking, photography, wildlife watching.
I had never really witnessed the fall season when I lived in India. For me, the fall season was more of a season you got to witness only in Yash Chopra movies where the lady clad in white clothes would wave her dupatta, running around forests and gardens that had turned beautiful shades of yellow and red. Remember the movies Silsila and Mohabbatein? It is amazing how much of our perception of things is based on movies. When I arrived in the U.S. in the fall a couple of years ago, I was amazed at the color changes nature assumed with the change in seasons. Spectators would see me staring open-mouthed at the continuing landscape of colors. One month into my moving to the U.S., I visited Mount Rainier National Park for a day hike in the fall colors. Mount Rainier is a volcanic mountain and the highest peak in the state of Washington. This national park is one of the three national parks in Washington. There are at least three different points of entering the national park (Paradise area, Longmire area, Sunrise area, etc.). There are more, but I haven’t been to them. This time we parked at the Paradise area and started hiking. There are different trails you can take, and most of them are easy or of moderate difficulty. The best thing about hiking from the Paradise area is that on a clear day, you get an amazing view of the mountain. We hiked for about 2 hours and between puffing, panting, and taking pictures, we managed to spot some wildlife too.
If you look at the last 4 pictures I have posted, they are the pictures of the same place (Paradise area) taken in June instead of October. There is amazing amount of snow during the summer which all melts by September to give way to the fall colors.
Nice write up and pics. You actually beat me up, I was planning to write up on Mt. Rainier :) You have not mentioned the name of fall, readers, Fall name is “Narada Fall”, and its written there that this fall has been named after Hindu mythological god Narada, which means uncontaminated.
I also had a visit to Mt. Rainier June 2009 during my 3 week visit to Seattle. It was good snow in June, which I saw last time in June 2002. The other place in these pictures seems to be of “Reflection lake”, I managed to get nice picture of it last time.
Drive on Highway 18 from Northbend, you will see beautiful fall colors, I think that is the best road to see fall colors.
wow… i could have spend hours watching the views
Best pictures I ever seen on Ghumakkare is here in this page………….. simply nice…
Great photos. I’ve never been there and would love to visit.
Devasmita,
These seems to be the picture perfect postcards.
Its great to start your day with a look at them :-)
Upanshu, what a coincidence (and I apologize for writing the post first:)) … yes I did not mention the name of the fall because I am bad with names :( Thanks for adding all the information :)
Onil, and that’s what I thought too :)
Kostubh, that’s a really big compliment :) You sure the others will not get mad at you?
sandy, yes you must absolutely :)
Manish, thank you so much :)
Extraordinarily exotic out of the world post and matching photographs. It is unique for us Indians because most of us have not experienced the real Fall season as there is non in India. The natures bounty so clearly visible in the beautiful pics can be another world, a beautiful one at that. Us has abundance of land and they have been able to preserve such beautiful places unharmed. The site of wild animals grazing peacefully is like Heaven.
Thank you Devasmita, you have done a great job by sharing this beauty with the rest of the world.
God Bless you