Washington: 5400 miles and the “other” Mount Vernon

George Washington’s Mount Vernon Estate in Fairfax, VA is the name sake of the 1877 founded Mount Vernon in Washington State. We didn’t know how many George Washington links there would be in our first President’s named state but it’s fun to visit some familiar names out west. Mount Vernon, WA was founded as a trading post in the late 1870 stemming from the Skagit River’s value in logging and other trade routes. Today it’s a small town feel with a burgeoning agro-tourism focus centered around their world famous Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. We were well past the festival season but the entire area is well managed and features the landscape and agricultural stewardship we’ve found in many areas of the Pacific Northwest, lots of green surrounded by flowers. We enjoyed the wooded surroundings of our Thousand Trails Mount Vernon Campground, located in nearby Bow, WA for the week of the 4th of July 🧨🎆🥳 while we took care of some additional family business back east.

Before we celebrated the 4th, Vince flew back east to Charolette, NC to move our oldest to Minneapolis. While almost 21 you still can’t rent a truck or car until 25 so Dad made a 5600 mile 5 day moving circuit from Seattle to Charlotte to Minneapolis and back to Seattle. 1600 miles driving and 4000 flying with even more hours sitting in airports due to flight changes… 😅 We will leave the airport drama details out because Vince’s experience was much less than most he met waiting for his flights 🤪A reminder to ItsDillerTime Crew, as we make our 2nd of 3 trips back east in a months time, when traveling from the west coast you loose 3 time zones so it’s early departure and late arrivals, especially when connecting flights get changed. These trips have been good but exhausting, especially with those really long layovers for connecting flights. So some trip highlights with just a touch of drama… because nobody likes lines at airports 🤪

What do you do when they change your 7:30am flight to a 6:30am but don’t tell you until 4am via text and it takes 2 hours to get to the airport? Thanks Southwest for breakfast and 6 hrs handing in the Seattle Airport. The French Toast was pretty good :)

Security line… good thing I wasn’t in a hurry.

There is a story about sitting shoulder to shoulder in the middle that involves some uncomfortable touching but I will spare you the details… it’s funnier when I tell it in person.

The little mound poking through the clouds is Mt. Rainier and Vince is off on a 5400 mile trip in 5 days.

Midway was Vince’s layover and he got a pretty sunset while waiting to board for Charlotte. Remember, Vince left the RV just after sunrise and he’s only ½ way…

12:30am in Charlotte rental line and Vince is 26th in line with more people throwing their hands up in the air in disgust than can be counted. Evidently most were on American and their flights were canceled. No 1 way rentals for the entire airport with hundreds stuck trying to drive home. Kinda like Plains, Trains and Automobiles scene but no John Candy from Sheboygan and lots of people with choice words filling Steve Martin’s roll :o/

Vince was fortunate to get a mini van with stow and go seating for the move! AMEN

What an entire apartment looks like packed into a mini-van! There is 4 in tunnel for Vince to see out the rear… don’t worry Vince’s Dad was a Driver’s Ed Teacher… he wouldn’t drive too full…

Nana and Grandpa helping clean out the apartment… they get 5 stars on YELP!

Lunch before hitting the road for our 1400 mile trip to Minneapolis!

And we’re off! Where was that 4in tunnel for the rear view mirror???

When you take a long road trip it's good to have family to stop and see. Brother Curtis and Vince out for a morning ride in the Lodi countryside in Wisconsin before finishing the last leg of the move to Minneapolis.

Ok TU peeps! For this familiar you should be singing Up Beyond the Village Boarder… This is the Taylor University Bell Tower nephew Cai made at TU’s summer science camp. The tradition of Dillers attending TU Summer camps continue. Curtis and Vince basketball camps and Cai’s is a bit more aesthetically pleasing. All Curtis and Vince brought home was really stinky clothes! Sorry Mom.

Sunset over Clear Lake near Curtis’s. Wisconsin in gorgeous this time of year.

Made it to Minneapolis and move-in is schedule for 10am tomorrow so we kill some time at the Mall of America. Vince’s face may look similar to his face at the TSA line in the airport but that’s cause the mall has lines of people too :O)

If you’ve never been, the Mall of America is huge and has a theme park inside the mall. Vince wasn’t riding rides so the lines didn’t apply… he was relieved.

Not that you can tell but this is the look of 20 something excitement when you get moved into your new apartment :oP Ok ok it was a long road trip and it looked more like the minivan backed up and dumped it all in but its all in and we managed to find a new/used couch before returning the rental!

Ok Vince found those long lines again… but this time it took 45 minutes and a light rail to find this line. For those ever flying with Sun Country Airlines out of Minneapolis, their terminal IS NOT located with the other airlines. It is a literal lightrail ride away on city transit and then some extremely long corridors before reaching Security. Vince didn’t know this but he got his mile walk in before boarding with 5 minutes to spare… literally.

Sun Country flight was not full and Vince managed to fly without having to have uncomfortable touching with any other passengers. He did lean over one to get this shot of Mount Rainier on approach into Seattle :)

Final leg of the trip is a 1:15 minute light rail ride from SeaTac to north of Seattle to save Mommy and boys a bit of traffic and we’re all back under our mobile roof again. This was one Planes, Trains and Automobiles trip that Vince will feel for awhile.

Michele and the boys took advantage of the Mount Vernon camp and area offerings while Vince was on his 5 day journey and visited ChuckECheese, Dave & Busters and the Boeing Factory for some fun and some education. The Boeing Factory is reportedly the largest in the US and while we show some pictures, cameras were confiscated in most areas for proprietary reasons. Cool visit though and recommended if you’re ever in the area.

Our RV camp had a basketball court that not only had a nice view but made for some fun for the boys outside the RV! The shot was good by the way!

Jayden even took on coaching Robert and he started making shots! Good job coach!

Chuck E Cheese and not sure what the face is but Peyton was a good brother and road the Giraffe ride with Robert :)

Mommy and Robert playing a VR game together at Dave and Buster’s.

On the educational side, a school field trip to Boeing kept the boys’ attention. The facility was massive and seeing how plains were built in this massive facility left a memorable impression. Learning on the road looks different from time to time :)

Most of the tour was NO CAMERAS but those we got were fun. This one impressed Robert, they had their own landing strip and they got to see some planes, including one military jet take off.

Due to a flat tire we missed our appointment to fix our RV’s leveling jacks and added to the RV repair bills with a $900 tire replacement. As it turns out, flat tires tend to break/bend the steel belt in the tire if you drive on them flat or let them sit too long flat, we did both 🤯. With jacks broken the flat sat for at least 3-4 days combined with the 1/2 mile we drove out of our camp before we noticed the low tire pressure, which resulted in a popping of steel bands when the mobile repairman fixed the leaking valve stem and reinflated the tire. Lesson learned for Vince not doing his safety checks before departure 🤨. Even a 10 min drive requires a safety check! Valve stem would have been a $20 repair vs replacement of a relatively new tire 😩 Expensive lesson but one that Vince learned via the School of Mobile Hard Knocks! Good news is that the repairman checked all the tire valves and found 3 of them to be prone to leaking so some preventative replacements is the best concession we could manage for this repair. FYI for those new to tire and truck tire maintenance, if the tubeless interior of the tire is dirty at all, the dirt can become crusted on the internal side of the valve causing it to stick and leak after checking tire pressure or adding air. To check for leaks, it’s advised to wet the valve stem after checking pressure to see if it bubbles (spot/water etc.). While Vince knew to listen/feel for leaks he didn’t wet check the valve stem like he will be. Also having metal valve caps that add to the seal helps. So we have all the above and yes, Vince checked tire pressure after we filled up before this stop, starting the slow leak while he was out of town. Paying our RV tuition bills is educational but no student loans for this class 👨‍🏫

Story above says it all! Only good part of this was the large casino parking lot to pull into with the flat once we realized what was going on.

Les Schwab did a good job and was pretty quick about it. Really wish truck tires came with a warranty for stupid drivers :o(

While waiting for the tire change Jayden got to test if his 16 year old self was ready for coffee… nope!

With the schedule changes resulting from our flat and attempted repairs, we bypassed the local 4th of July Rodeo 🤠 in favor of getting up to the North Cascades National Park. Didn’t want to miss this remote Alpine park just south of the Canadian boarder. We did a river hike in our limited time but found the turquoise waters of Diablo Lake a particular treat, despite the rapidly increasing winds. The turquoise water is a result of glacial melting and the type of rock/minerals in the area. The fine sediment reflects turquoise particularly after the spring/summer melt 😊

Which look is more intimidating?

LOTS to see but we had to choose with a limited time up in the park.

Took a short mile hike out to the Skagit River after some Jr Ranger education.

Some old growth Cyprus that had burned out on the inside but stayed tall and was still growing. Jayden fit inside but had to squeeze.

Pretty hike through the tree. Not as tall as some we’ve see on the west coast but pretty and lots of green!

View from the top observation point for Diablo Lake. The winds had picked up to about 50 mph but we got a great view of the mountain peaks and Diablo Lake.

It’s called Diablo Lake so Jayden had to jump in and Peyton filmed. :O)

Wind blown superman trying to dry off.

Gorge Creek Falls was a pretty stop.

We wrap this blog with a distractingly beautiful Alpine drive from Mount Vernon to Leavenworth, WA through Steven’s Pass for our stop at the quaint Bavarian town for an erholung (German for respite 🤓). More from Leavenworth on our next blog.

More from Leavenworth on our next blog…