Western National Park Trip: Part 7 (August 2025)

Our final national park of this trip was Mount Rainier National Park which was our 47th national park to visit together. It was stunning. Every pullout on the scenic road gave us amazing views of Mount Rainier. Our first stop was in the Longmire Historic District. Some of the buildings here were built in the late 1890s and early 1900s. We stopped in the museum to learn more about the area. We worked hard hiking to three beautiful waterfalls, a meadow full of wildflowers with a doe and fawn, and crossing a raging mountain stream. We had plans to ride the Mount Rainier Gondola at Crystal Mountain Resort, but we ran into a traffic jam or accident. After sitting in traffic barely moving for 1/2 hour, we decided to make a U-turn and returned to Longmire where we ate a late lunch in the historic dining area. After lunch we continued to explore the Longmire area and then started our 2-hour drive to Tumwater, Washington.

Day 16

This was another travel day. We drove through the states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho for almost 9 hours before arriving back in Boise, Idaho which we had left 2 weeks ago.

Day 17

This was a rest day to help us recuperate before a long day of flying home. We visited several sites in Boise including the Morrison Knudsen Nature Center, the Idaho Botanical Garden, the Old Idaho Penitentiary Museum, and the Boise River Greenbelt.

Morrison Knudsen Nature Center

Idaho Botanical Garden

Old Idaho Penitentiary

Boise River Greenbelt

Day 18

We left our hotel around 4:30 am and dropped off our rental car and caught a very early flight to Denver. Our next stop was Nashville and finally we made it home to Greenville, SC. Our trip took 18 days, six plane flights, 4,500 miles on the rental car, nine national parks, three national monuments, and one state park. Now time to start planning our next national park trip.