Mount Rainier
 

I have grown to love Mt. Rainier. It’s one my favorite things about living in Washington (that and the seafood). Annually we buy a yearly pass and get up there as much as we can during the summer and fall. My wife and I started taking our kids there when my daughter (oldest) was six months old – just threw her in one of those kids packs.

It gets crowded in the summers, but if you go early there are still places where you can be alone.

How many cities can claim, like Seattle, three national parks within a 100 mile readius of downtown?

That's one of the reason it's on our itenerary for our vacation this summer. That is if we can afford the diesel. :(

I'll see your 3 National Parks within a 10 mile radius and raise you 5 National Parks within a 6 hour drive from SLC - all in the same state. 7 if you want to count Yellowstone and Great Basin.

;)

If you're talking about SLC there aren't any national parks in northern or even central Utah. I'm talking about real national parks like Zions, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, Bryce, as enacted by Congress, not state parks or national monuments or national forests. NATIONAL PARKS. Within 100 miles of downtown Seattle are Rainier, NOrth Cascades and Olympic NATIONAL PARKS. Utah has more national parks in the state than anyplace except California and Alaska I think but they're all in the southern part of the state.

You're correct - that's why I mentioned that they're within a 6 hour drive of SLC.

Was the plan to drive your RV up from TX?

Yep. We had planned a 3 week trip to Northern Cal, Oregon, Washington, maybe even up into Canada (Banff, etc.). But it was like a 4000 mile round trip. At $3 / gallon for diesel and 10 mpg ... that's big $$$.

$1200 is pocket change for you!

Plus diesel is less than $3. It's like $2.80.

Here. But averaging in CA prices, etc. that's what I figured.

You will become a laughingstock if it is generally known that you canceled a vacation over $1200.

Vegas is close to those Southern Utah National Parks as well as the Grand Canyon National Park.

There's more to it than that. Work conflicts, new house, etc. And we haven't decided for sure. Also, we've looked at several different routes and I posted that quick like ... the trip we had in mind which included all of the above was more like 7K miles.

From the $ standpoint, we're trying to decide whether to buy trees or go on vacation. As you can imagine, we need lots of trees. ;)

Kanab, UT?

If you end up taking the trip, you have to stop the RV in Redding and do dinner with me and goose.

Good call. Any of those little So. Utah towns would work as well.

My wife's hometown can claim that. Up it to 250 miles and the number goes to six. 300 or so and you get seven.

My hometown has a really nice stadium.

Seems to me the key word in SU's original post was "cities". Should he have said "major metro area"?

Right. I think he was referring to the fact that from Seattle you can drive 90 miles to a National Park in the morning and be home in time for an evening MLB, NFL or NBA game or world-class dinning.

Not that Panguitch is without its qualities.

Seattle is a great place. No argument there.