art thou?: July 2026

Bellissima Arts Escape 2026: Washington, The Carlsons, and Portland (Part One)

July 6, 2026 to July 7, 2026

Monday, July 6, 2026

Another day, another adventure for the team of Denice and Gary Warren Niebuhr. This one, a trip to the states of Washington and Oregon (including a workshop at Belissima Arts for me) began with us rising at 2:00 a.m. (CST) to get ready to leave. Our sister-in-law Marijeanne was kind enough to pick us up at 3:30 a.m. for our flight out of Milwaukee on Alaska Airlines.

We took off from Milwaukee at 4:00 a.m. (PST) and landed one half-hour early in Seattle at 8:00 a.m. After getting our Budget rental car (a Volkswagon Taos) we were off and running. We only ran as far as the first available parking lot near the airport in order to get mirrors, windshield washers and other amenities situated in the car. As it turns out, that was a Denny’s parking lot and seeing as how Denny’s is our stop every Monday morning before grocery shopping, it seemed only appropriate we eat there (P.S.: it’s the same menu—shocking).

I told you it was our Monday tradition so when we got to Puyallup we went grocery shopping for our upcoming stay in the national park. We also hit an Ace hardware store there to get me some supplies for my workshop that I did not want to carry on the plane.

Also in Puyallup was Founding Family Antiques—so some things were purchased for the upcoming workshop. For dinner tonight, we stopped outside the national park to eat at the Paradise Village Ukrainian Restaurant.

On our way to the park, we pulled off a side road because it was our first sighting of Mount Rainier.

Our trip from the Seattle-Tacoma Airport all the way to Mount Rainier National Park is only about 70 miles. However, with distractions, it took us 6 hours to get to the park--distractions like these cool old cars.

Finally we got to Mount Rainier National Park and our home for the next two nights, Paradise Inn on the national park grounds.

The hotel lobby

Looking our our bedroom window we saw

Once we got into our room and unpack, we took a walk down to the Visitor’s Center to see Mount Rainer. Evidently like other mountains (Denali, Fuji, Everest), your chances of seeing it is weather dependent. Denice and I are lucky (ask us our story about flying to Denali) because for our entire stay in the park we could see the mountain (except at night went it was very dark).

After being up for something like 20 hours, we both were in bed and asleep by 9:00 p.m.

Mileage for the Day: 70

Tuesday, July 7, 2026

Because we went to bed so early last night we were both awake by 6:00 a.m. We decided since the sun was just rising, we would do the short walks around the inn prior to breakfast.

Parking Lot Art

First up was the Skyline Trail to Myrtle Falls, an easy walk 1 mile roundtrip from Paradise Inn. Besides the nice weather, it definitely the right time of year to view the spectacular wildflowers in bloom.

We were on a trail above another trail watching some tourists taking this guys photo from much closer than we were. It is blurry because of the distance and my inability to stabilize the lens.

Our first deer--it is going to get better this morning

As we came down a path we first saw the mother(?) and then it got better. After awhile we realized the deer pretty did not much care that we were there.

Next we went hiking on the 1.2 mile roundtrip Nisqually Vista Trail. It is surprising to both of us how tired we were when we got back to the lodge—we need to work harder to get in hiking shape if we do this again.

Full disclosure: it is not cheap to stay in a national park. Our room at the Paradise Inn was $333 a night. That being said, after we saw what we saw with the convenience of the location, we decided it was worth it. However, this morning we decided to eat the breakfast buffet in the Paradise Inn which ended up costing us around $75 (yikes!).

Now it was time to ride The Senior Bus so we got in the rental and put it through its paces for a seven hour drive around the park.

We took the Valley Road out to Stevens Canyon Road (Highway 123). This was so that we could get to Mather Memorial Highway (Highway 410), an all-American roads with spectacular landscapes. We took to the cut off to Sunrise, the highest point accessible by vehicle at 6400 feet, with incredible high-alpine vistas.