Mount Rainier National Park Associates: Jacks and Jills of All Trades

The volunteers at Mount Rainier National Park Associates have many talents: trail work in any and all weather conditions, invasive species removal (or conquering alien invaders), revegetation of once destroyed meadows, and advocating for Mount Rainier National Park.  MRNPA has been a longtime partner of Mount Rainier, and over the years have played a crucial role in preservation of the beautiful resources that we all share in the park.  This year, MRNPA has volunteered 468 hours doing trails projects, 84 hours participating in the annual "deveg" day, removing exotic species, and 170 hours replanting native species in the former Sunrise Camp.  This totals to 720 hours of volunteering, equating to a value of $16,610.40!!

A huge thank you is in order to the Mount Rainier National Park Associates for all of their hard work and their longstanding dedication to the park over the past 30 years! 

 

Interested in learning more about MRNPA?  Seeing some of the projects they have participated in over the years?  Learning how to sign up for the next projects?  Visit www.mrnpa.org today!

Starbucks' Weekend at Mount Rainier

The trails crew at Paradise was lucky to have another eager and energetic group coming out to volunteer this past weekend.  Team members from a variety of Starbucks location across the state came out for a weekend of volunteering here at Mount Rainier National Park. 

 

After a brief round of introductions of everyone in attendance, the crew was led to the front porch of the ranger station at Paradise where they received an overview of the two projects that will be occuring, and given the option of choosing one or the other to start their day with. 



The first project was to work on widening a section of the Avalanche Lily trail back to its original width. A goal of the trails crew is to repave this trail in the near future, and in order to do this, the trail must be cleared of any debris and duff that has grown over the trail since it was last paved over fifty years ago.

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The second portion of the project this weekend involved working on creating stone edges for the recently paved portion of the Skyline trail.  Without this work, the newly laid asphault would crumble from the outside, in, and this ever popular trail would not be able to be traveled until repaving occured. 



With thanks to the volunteers of Starbucks, as well as the hundreds of other volunteers that come through Mount Rainier every month, we are able to protect such an awe-inspiring resource that we have right in our backyard.

MRNPA Work Party, August 15th

From John Titland:

The August 15th Mount Rainier National Park Associates volunteer work party will be this coming Saturday.  We will be doing maintenance work on the Skyline Trail above Paradise.  We will meet between 8:30 and 9:00 AM in the upper parking lot at Paradise, near the entrance to the Paradise Valley Road.  Look for Scotty's big white pickup truck and all the people wearing blue hard hats.

If you will be attending this work party and have not already contacted me, please respond to volunteer (at) mrnpa.org to indicate you are coming and also tell me the number of volunteers you are bringing with you.

John Titland
Volunteer Coordinator
Mount Rainier National Park Associates

September is still trail maintenance month for WTA

Autumn is definitely setting in in the mountains, with cool nights and lots of amber grasses in the landscape. Still, the days are sunny and beautiful with blue skies, and the Washington Trails Association is still busy maintaining trails at Mount Rainier National Park! If you're looking for a late-season volunteer project, check out the full list of WTA projects at http://www.wta.org/volunteer/trail-work-parties, and look for the ones labeled Mount Rainier. This month's work is scheduled for the gorgeous Skyline Trail at Paradise.

A reminder, too: Saturday September 27 will be National Public Lands Day, so mark that on your calendar and plan to come out and help! We'll be doing multiple trail projects in the Paradise area on that date.