World United States Washington Seattle

The Patricks Low Cost Housing Adventures

Washington State Nov 10, 2011

What an incredibly, beautiful weekend we had in the northwest! After taking quite a few pictures that were not to my satisfaction, I’ve decided to ask for a new camera for Christmas. The Blackberry smartphone just doesn't cut it. Thank goodness for all the photos I can copy from the internet! We saw so much that I don’t know here to start. Let’s begin with the elks. When driving thru the mountain range area of Idaho, I spotted a herd of about 30 elk less that 1 mile from the interstate. This is the first time we have ever seen so many during daylight hours in the wild. Here is a picture of what it looked like. Usually, their large bulk startles you at night when they are grazing along the shoulder of the interstate, turning you blood to ice. They are such magnificent creature! Later that day, after crossing the last mountain pass over the Cascades in Washington state, we settled into a truckstop still high up in altitude. Our delivery was very early in the morning, so we got up at 1 a.m. to head into the Seattle metro area. Right in front of us, on the grassy shoulder area between the highway and truckstop was another herd of about 10 elk, mostly young bucks, not even 10 feet away! Beautiful! Sixty percent of Washingtons 5.9 million population is the Seattle metro area. And right in the heart of this was our second drop, Harbor Island port. We headed in early to avoid the massive traffic backups that plague this area. This was a bustling, busy scene; full of harbor cranes, barges, trains and ships. One minute it was quiet, than at 7am, everything came to life! In the early morning light, the huge, gantry cranes looked like something from H.G. Wells “War of the Worlds”. These huge cranes load/unload hundreds of containers from Asian ships. There are literally mountains of containers, full of everything imaginable, being put on special trailers bases, and driven about by trucks to part all over the country. Containers also get transferred onto trains to go by rail. There were big barges that come from Alaska carrying rail cars eight rows wide! I even saw a big Atlantic Seafood ship like on the TV show that goes to Alaska and catches crabs. I talked to a bunch of people and took quite a few pictures. Finally someone asked what I was doing in that area. “Just taking pictures.” Guess I wore out my welome. I gues I was somewhere I wasn't suppose to be. Time to go! Washington state has many different environment. Coastal mountains in rain forests, arid plains, the central basin thats agricultural, volcanic fields, waterfalls, mountain glaciers, just a beautiful state. And when its not raining in Seattle area, which isn’t often, Mt. Rainier reigns in the distance. It’s a majestic sight, that commands your attention. We just couldn’t help staring at it. It’s 14,411 ft. and at sea level it looks huge! That’s almost 3 times Mt Katadin in Maine. Agricultural industry includes Seafood, dairy products, apples, cattle, wheat, potatoes, and nursery stock. This is what we normally take out of this area. Looks like this time we will be hauling potatoes to Yuma, AZ. I’ve got to stop and get this posted! I am way behind! I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills,from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth. Psalm 121:1&2

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