It's that time of year again! The fam and I trekked into the mountains this summer. Here are 10 highlights and 5 lowlights from this summer's trip:

1. BANFFFFFFFFF: The hype is all true. Magestic, Breathtaking. Restorative. Surreal. Insert a thesaurus worth of positive superlatives here. I did not even mind the waiting and the throngs of tourists. If anything, it made me happy tto share the beauty with them. (Pic with turquoise Peyto Lake below)

2. Glacier National Park: This had the beauty of Banff, minus the turquoise lakes. I want to go back and get a second shot at Going-to-the-Sun Road. But more on that in the lowlights.

3. North Cascades: After Glacier and Banff I was sure this national park would not hold a candle and maybe even feel disappointing. So happy to be wrong. The waterfalls alone are worth the drive.

4. Temps: Part of why we escape north for our family trips is to get out of Texas heat. And this trip did not disappoint. We only had one day I would consider hot, but the beauty tempered it.

5. Huckleberries: No, not Finn. It turns out he lived way too far south from where these grow. But the mountains have them. Think tart blueberry. And if you know my palate, you know that means tasting joy.

6. Rain: Yes, I know this is a strange highlight for a vacation. It did pour while we were in Glacier, causing some flash flooding and a few evacuations. But it never rained like that when we were out and about. It was just occasional gentle showers, making every green crisp and the air washed. There was magic in the drops.

7. Food in general: My post-vacation belt hole change says I enjoyed eating on this trip. Which was a little surprising. I knew I'd be in Asian and seafood heaven once we got to the PNW. But everywhere we went had tasty food. In Canada it was even reasonably priced (before the conversion). I only got tired of pizza once this time. Which probably had more than a little to do with my belt situation.

8. Bellingham: I hadn't given this town much thought when Emily said we'd be staying there. But it was quite lovely. Small, but not too small. Quaint without being delapidated. I could see myself spending a lot more time there.

9. Renton: (Pic reading at lake house below). Smaller than Bellingham. More rural. Quiet. Yet still a short drive from major metro Seattle. A writer's dream. Can also see myself spending a swath of life here.

10. Wine and beer: This part of the world is known for both of these and they were consistently lovely. Tried to only drink local and regretted it only twice. Be nice to me and don't ask what that was in the ratio.

And now time for the lower lit parts of the trip:

1. Fog on Going-to-the-Sun Road: 5AM wakeup. On the mountain road at 6AM. At 620AM encountered the worst fog of my life. Could not see 40 ft in front of us. And this was on a narrow mountain switchback with an embarrasment of a guardwall. My life is at least a year shorter from stress. The insult to injury was we could not see a single view this road is known for. Guess it means we have to go back. Bummer.

2. Calgary: I've loved every place we've been in Canada so far. But I just liked Calgary. It was fine.

3. Kelowna: I desperately wanted to like this place. When a friend told me about its four seasons, its lake and river, its wine/cheese country, its high farm-to-table ratio, and its low population density, I was sure I'd found my retirement spot. But it was so dry. Almost desert-like. And windy. There was a fast-moving grass fire on the side of the highway when we got there. And it was a little pretentious. It felt like California wine country, or at least like it was trying to be. And it missed.

4. Wildfires: I saw today that Canadian smoke is making into the Midwest and East. It had found us in Montana. It seemed to nail home, in a hard-to-breathe way, the long reach of climate change. On the plane ride back to Austin we flew over a giant wildfire in Colorado. I know I write about inundation, but it is sobering to see the world burn like a stack of my discarded pages.

5. The return: On this trip I think I finally put down some heavy emotional things I'd been carrying. And coming back meant I had to pick them back up. And having not held them for this long makes them feel much, much different. I'm still working out how to carry them in a way that makes sense, or if I want to carry them at all. I think this is the price paid after any vacation/soul cleansing pause.

And now to reward your diligent reading, here are some pics: