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Our first stop is Mt. Rainier National Park–my favorite Park. I’ve climbed Mt. Rainier at least 4 times and spent two summers working on Camp Schurman in the early 1960s. Here we’re hiking with our friends Rog and Pam–this is Martina on the Pebble Creek trail. We stayed in the Paradise Inn that night which was the last night of operation before they close the building for two years for a remodel. Our Ranger Doug foundation donates to such projects–keeping the old lodge look in the Parks. That ugly round visitors center will be removed but I don’t think the new one is much better. Another of my projects would be to redesign Camp Muir at 10,000′ and remove most of the structures there except the historic buildings.

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Here Martina is basking in the sun at Amphitheater Lake in the Tetons where I used to be a climbing ranger. This is at about 10,000′ on the route to the North Face of the Grand Teton–considered one of the finest alpine climbs in the world. We’re “back at the ranch” which is now the A Lazy D
after discovering the original branding iron of my uncle, David Abercrombie. Here’s what the branding iron looks like:

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and here’s David Abercrombie posing for the Union Pacific Railway in 1936. His father was the founder of Abercrombie and Fitch, the great sporting goods store, that is, not the teenie-bopper one of today.

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After a few more days rest, we’re off to Mesa Verde…..