I'm having a great time here. The scenery is spectacular, and the weather has been pretty nice. Believe it or not, it hasn't rained the whole time I've been here. The other day I took a trip to Mt. Rainier National Park with a couple of friends. It's about a 2-hour drive from Seattle. Actually, on clear days you can see Mt. Rainier from the city. (There's a great view from the UW campus by the way.) It's over 4,000 meters high and it looks enormous!

The park itself is great. There are lots of streams, waterfalls and lakes. Most of it is thick forest. There are even some parts where the trees are over a thousand years old. You can drive up out of the forest to a place called Paradise, where you can get great views of the mountain and the glaciers. Up there, there's still snow on the ground and it's the middle of summer! We did a bit of hiking, saw a bunch of ground squirrels and took tons of pictures. Didn't see any bears, though. There are supposed to be some in the park!

Anyway, it was a really fun trip and I'm already planning my next one!

Take care,

George