in the Pacific Northwest
That's what people here say when the clouds lift and Mount Rainier fills the sky. Come and see the rest.
That's what people here say when the clouds lift and Mount Rainier fills the sky. Come and see the rest.
It's still there. And the rain is why everything here is this green.
Morning fog off the water. Give it a few hours.
Somewhere up there, the first chair is about to load.
West to east
Start on the wild coast at dawn and finish in the wheat hills at sunrise. On the way: the wettest forest in the lower 48, the Sound at dusk and the volcanoes under the stars.
1 · The coast
73 miles
of wild Pacific coast in Olympic National Park
Out past the beach, sea stacks stand where headlands used to be. They belong to the birds now: the rocks and islands off this coast are National Wildlife Refuges.
On the sand, whole trees lie where winter storms left them. Give the drift logs room: one wave can roll them.
2 · The rainforest
140 inches
of rain a year in the Hoh: almost 12 feet
All that rain is why the bigleaf maples wear coats of moss and the sword ferns come up to your waist.
The Olympics wring the clouds out on their way in. About 40 miles away as the raven flies, Sequim sits in their rain shadow and gets about 16 inches.
3 · The Sound
21 ferries
in the largest ferry system in the United States
Washington State Ferries carried 20.1 million riders in 2025, between 20 terminals on a Sound with more than 2,500 miles of shoreline. Orcas hunt salmon between the islands.
Long before it was Puget Sound, this water had a Lushootseed name, whulge: the salt water.
4 · The Cascades
14,410 feet
Mount Rainier, the highest peak in the range
Mount Baker, Glacier Peak, Mount Rainier, Mount Adams and Mount St. Helens. Rainier carries 28 major glaciers, more ice than any other peak in the lower 48.
At Paradise, 5,400 feet up its side, about 640 inches of snow fall in an average year, and it can last into July.
5 · East of the mountains
8 inches
of rain in a year at Yakima. Seattle gets about 39.
Cross the passes and the clouds run out. The Palouse rolls on in hills of Ice Age dust, blown in on the wind and now some of the richest wheat ground anywhere.
Whitman County alone planted nearly half a million acres of wheat in the last farm census.
