A Weekend Away

Thank goodness life is made up of moments like this.

Last weekend, Levent and I headed to the Pacific Northwest on a mini-vacation. The timing couldn't have been more perfect. Well, actually the whole weekend was absolute perfection.

This is really iconic due the nature of how this trip came about. Last spring, I headed to Seattle for work and had a hell of a time getting there due to mechanical problems. That really frustrating moment resulted in a fairly large voucher from Alaska Airlines and a decision to plan a trip to Seattle with Levent, despite the fact that Christmas is coming (and we have to spend all our money on those travels). But we're young and have no real responsibilities; so we went. I remember telling Levent that I thought we would regret it if we didn't go. Of course, I had no way of knowing how true this would have been.

We actually stayed south of the city (and the airport), in Des Moines, Washington. (Our airbnb was this very cute tiny house). Our main aim was to go to Mt Rainer National Park and do some hiking.

And girl, did we hike.  By the end of each day, our bodies were completely spent. (Our Kansas selves don't spent a lot of time going up hill. After day 1, my abs hurt from hiking).  But every ache and trail climbed was 100% worth it.

Here were some of the highlights.

Day 1: Saturday, November 3

Breakfast/brunch at Marine View Espresso where we feasted on crepes. (It was also the cutest coffee shop).

The nice thing about going to a National Park in the off season is that it often felt like we had the entire place to ourselves. If I thought about this too long, it would maybe freak me out. But for the most part, it was like being an enchanted forest with no lines or waiting to hike. Plus we stocked up on proper cold weather/rain gear for this. So we were totally fine, warm and dry.

Our Saturday hike consisted of hiking the Narada Falls to Reflection Lake trail. Which started with a stunning waterfall right off the bat.

We then hiked the trail to reflection lake.

We ended up going the wrong way for a little bit after reflection lake, but we figured that out in plenty of time to not end up like those Millennials in the news who die in the woods because they aren't prepared. I really enjoy how green and lush everything was. I especially loved the smell of pine that often would invade our senses. Oh, and don't forget all the different kinds of mushrooms that were doing their work all over the place.

After a long after of wonderful hiking, we headed back to the city, cleaned up and went out for supper at Via Marina Woodfire pizza and Italian Cafe.

Day 2: Sunday, November 4

Thanks to the time change and the fact that we had a little bit better idea what we were doing, we had lots of time in the Park on Sunday. But first, we stopped for brunch in Kent at Wild Wheat Cafe

We did several mini trails on Sunday afternoon.  The first was just this little path for a lookout. This was basically the best view we had of the mountains all weekend due to how cloudy and misty it was.

The second trail we went on was the twin furs trail. It was also a short loop, but this was the part of the park that had the largest trees I've ever seen in real life. It was incredible.

Next up was Carter falls. For this trail, we walked along a glacier river. One of the coolest things about this park was how different each of the areas was. (I was delighted by this, which maybe just shows you that I live in a place with very steady elevation). 

Our next plan was to go to a trail higher up in the park, but turns out it was pretty high up, thus the road was closed. It was also snowing like crazy. So we just drove as far as we could, got out and took a picture in the snow and head back down. 

Our last trail option was to go to Christine Falls, which was another waterfall pretty near the trailhead. But we knew if we kept going on that trail we would eventually end up at Comet Falls. So up we went. We stopped to enjoy Christine Falls and then blindly heading onward. 

I say blindly because we knew the trail was about 2 miles, but we had no idea, really, how steep this climb would be. We almost gave up several times. We also knew we needed to be mindful of the light (especially since we just had the time change and it would be dark by 5). So, we just decided to do as much as we could and/or go until 4pm, then turn back. I am so grateful that we had it in us to keep going. 

The view at the top took my breath away (well, to be fair, so did the hike). 

It. was. magical. 

Truly one of the most beautiful things I've seen in my whole life. It was somehow both snowing and rainy and at one moment the sun was trying to come out. 

But it was about to get 100 times better. 

Levent asked me to marry him on the top of this mountain. And, of course, I said yes. (I also might've cried and made some kind of shrieking noise). 

The moment was perfection. He couldn't have planned it better if he would've tried. I am really glad that he just went for the spontaneous proposal. (He actually wasn't planning on doing this on this particular trip).  I never want to forget this moment. 

We stayed up there for a little bit longer to savor the moment before we had to haul it back down the mountain, racing with the sun setting. But we made it back to the car right by 5pm, soaking wet and incredibly happy. 

After we got back to the house and cleaned up, we had a late dinner at a Kurdish restaurant, Marlainas Mediterranean Kitchen. Because it was 8pm on a Sunday night, we had the entire place to ourselves. Seriously, my fiancé could not have planned this any better if he tried. 

  

Thank goodness life is full of moments like this.

Here's to many more adventures together.