Girls Weekend

We've had a couple of busy weeks. First we went to the state square dance festival in Longview over the June 20-21 weekend. We had fun dancing being with our friends, Everett and Virginia.

We traveled home over highway 410 through Morton and Randle, etc. We met up with friends, Paul and Carol, in Randle and did a 7 mile round trip hike. We thought it was suppose to have a 800 foot elevation gain hike, but we did more like 2000 feet of elevation gain. We had to walk 1 1/4 miles to get to the trailhead and after reading the trailhead sign on the way out discovered it said that the elevation gain was 1700 feet. And the last 1/2 mile or so was on snow. We were doing the Blue Lake trail but stopped about 1/4 mile short of the lake - it was just too hard walking on the snow. But, it was lots of fun and a beautiful trail along a rushing stream.

Next on our agenda was a girls weekend for me. I drove to Yakima where I met up with 5 other women from the bank where I worked for 20 years. After lunch, we headed down to Maryhill museum on the Columbia gorge. Next was a fun wine tasting at the Maryhill Winery. One of our group had purchased a tour of the winery through a fund raising event. We heard all about the wine making process, tasted wine in the barrel room, and even had a taste right out of the barrel.

Next we drove to Skamania Lodge in Stevenson, Washington. This is a huge resort with hiking trails and a golf course. We had dinner at the lodge and then headed to bed. Sunday morning 5 of us took a 2 mile walk from the lodge. Then after showers we had the breakfast buffet at the lodge. After checking out we headed across the street the Columbia Gorge Interetive Center. This center had great displays and a movie on the history of the gorge. All too soon our weekend was over. We sure had fun talking, driving, drinking wine, and walking. We must give a huge thank you to Susan who bought the wine tasting tour, arranged the whole thing, and drove her car. Our group tries to meet quarterly to walk, but this was the first time (and I hope not the last time) we had gone overnight anywhere.