Seattle - Northwest Trek Wildlife Park

Ever want to frustrate yourself and your wife, buy a garmin GPS in Australia, load maps for the USA over the internet and then try and use it when you get to the USA....... Needless to say we hired a car for a drive out to the Northwest Trek Wildlife Park and then Mount Rainier and lets just say it took us a little longer than planned to get out of Seattle.......

 

Once we found the Northwest Trek all was good. We started with an open mini-bus tour through the 'free range' area of the park. The animals are pretty free to roam where ever they choose. So it really was a case of keeping your eyes open and getting lucky.

Bighorn sheep: not much explaining needed.

 Bison. Pretty impression animals.

 

 A young bull bison. He was massive and we were glad he didn't come too much closer to the bus.

 

 Apparently none of the parks three moose had been spotted for about five days, so we got lucky.

 The animals definately aren't phased by the vehicles, with the bus having stop several times to let them cross over the path.

 

 National Geographic sort of stuff.

Reindeer. No signs of the fat man in the red suit though.

 

After the bus ride we strolled through the area with the smaller enclosures. This is about the closest we got to an american eagle. Magnificent bird. 

Nothing like being a bear here. Sleeping most of the day and somebody brings your food to you.

 

 

 Not quite buddy.

 

 'Please God - get the keeper over here with some chow'.

 

 The 'honey badger'. The toughest critter on earth. 

 Indi needed a little convincing at times to keep walking.

 

The mandatory bear photo at the end.

 

The Northwest Trek was definately worth the frustration getting out of Seattle.