🏕️ Go Camping

Washington has many blessings, but one of the best is the easy access to places where you can enjoy the outdoors. Iʼve written previously about the majestic sights around Mount Rainier, and they are great! You should spend lots of time in our national parks (I need to spend more in Olympic and, especially, the North Cascades). Yet parks that wind up on millions of license plates arenʼt the only game in town.

Our state parks are also gems. Some are unique treasures that donʼt really have many peers: marine state parks that reserve small islands in Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands for public use. Others are more like roadside stops: some of the Eastern Washington parks (Lyons Ferry comes to mind. Most are in-between: good places to see some trees and a body of water, and the best have camping.

Millersylvania State Park

Drive about ten minutes south of the State Capitol on Interstate 5, and you will start getting into what feels like "real woods." Now, behind many of these woods are actually industrial lots, an airport, and the state surplus depot, but the feeling still is good. Get off the freeway, drive by some storage units on State Route 121, and you actually do get into some woods. Within a couple miles of the West Coastʼs principal roadway is Millersylvania State Park.

If you go expecting perfect wilderness, forget it. There are too many sites, too close to a large town for that. Instead, you get something that is also valuable: accessible nature.

Summer is a good time to disconnect, but I have struggled this season. I donʼt think I have given myself the time off from screens I normally do. Yet even in this somewhat flustered summer break, I can create some distance by just driving away for an hour.

There is something about being surrounded by very tall trees that makes your phone feel stupid. Why am I staring at this corporate product in the shadow of wooded Leviathan? Being in Creation helps me reach for what is better in myself and around me. I know I come up short a lot, but these parks are close. I can always get into a car and try again.

While Millersylvania has its flaws, I am glad it is there. A lake, a safe spot for the family to ride bikes, some hot dogs, and big-ass trees have a way of putting small-time obsessions into perspective.