The Mountain

Living so close to majestic Mt. Rainier; catching glimpses of it on the horizon; hearing on the news when it is particularly visible or spectacular; seeing pictures, paintings, coffee cups, t-shirts, and all other manner of souvenirs featuring it… very enticing!

But it turns out that you can’t really GO there.

Snow loads are such that roads are only open, basically, in June, July, August and early September, although some of them are listed as ‘scheduled opening, June 29th’ (not much of June left there) and still others as not likely to open this season at all. Snow loads have also been a big problem at Paradise Lodge – the main entrance point to the best views, maybe? – which is literally falling down under the pressure and now being rebuilt. But the big problem is parking.

With construction, the already pathetically meager parking situation is down to 3 spaces and a cliff. The website suggests that you ‘carpool’ to the mountain. (Does this sound familiar? Unlike the zoo, there is no bus.) Even without the construction complications, evidently you need to go during the week and avoid holidays or even week days close to holidays in order to get a parking place – which fill up ‘by noon’ according to our sources. (The park is, of course, 3-4 hours drive from our place.)

I suppose one person could hang out of the car window as you drive by and take pictures so that you can see it when you get home.

Of course there don’t seem to be any plans to increase parking; that would, no doubt, spoil the esthetics of the thing for the only people who seem to be able to actually enjoy it up close – the Park Service employees. The ones who are doing the planning for all this. Looking into this, I find that the annual budget for the park is some $9,052,000 and includes 125 permanent positions, several term positions and 165 seasonal positions. All of whom, presumably, need a parking place first.

I looked further, for: Annual Performance Goals: Curiously, the first stated goal in their ‘plan’ is “for the enjoyment of the people.” They just don’t specify which people. Visitation is declining, they say, with evident remorse, in their “Annual Plan.” This is due to the parking problem, they also admit. But nowhere in the plan are ‘plans’ for increasing parking. There is a comment about “because there have been no restrictions on the number of vehicles entering the park…” so I would guess that is their preferred solution instead.

I’m sorry to be missing it all. The pictures are lovely. Wish I had some of my own. But I guess that won’t be happening. We’ll just keep on paying the taxes to support it all. That should be enjoyment enough.