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Waking up in the sleazy motel surrounded by empty bottles of Rainier beer, Mike stated "we did Rainier, now lets do Rainier!!". After climbing on Mt. Hood and having climbed to the summit of Mount St. Helen, the boys thought that Rainier would be an easy climb. So back into the ever-more growing funky smelling rental car (with the wafting fumes of stale beer), the boys loaded up a two cases of Rainier (beer) and drove to the Mount Rainier National Park.
Three Men and a Mountain
The scene that day at Mt. Rainier, was one of those unusual days in the Northwest. It was in the low 80's with low humidity, a bright blue sky, and three drunkards carrying a cooler full of "refreshment" around the Park.
The Pinnacles Part 1, hills surrounding Mount Rainier
The Pinnacles Part 2, on the path at 6,000 feet
Toasting Rainier with a Rainier, in front of Rainer!!
Carrying a full cooler up a hill is in no fun. So the best way to address this problem is to stop often and "refresh" yourselves. This provided multiple benefits, which included:
Allowing time for rest
Lightening the load
Providing the boys the unparalleled opportunity to observe the double whammy of increasing blood/alcohol content with decreasing levels of oxygen.
Mike, Bone and Hadrian found out that when drinking on a mountain, the higher you get, well,,,, the "higher" you get.
The Pinnacles Part 3, on the path at 7,500 feet
A River Runs Through It
From this point on the climb, it was easy to see how the run off from the Glacier forms the Rainer River below.
A Mountain, a Glacier, a Mike, and a Beer !!
The stunning scenario below depicts the awesome panorama of the National Park. Oh! Yeah! There's Mike holding up a Rainier beer !!!
A Postcard Quality picture of Rainer and it's Glaciers
Notice the blue of the sky. It is a very true representation of the color of the sky that day much like the amber of the Rainier beers !!
Rainer, Bone and Hadrian, drinking a brew!!
Climbing is thirsty work and so the Boys took a break up on path up to the glacier fields carrying the critical "supplies."
Mike and Bone drinking an icy cold beer on the Glacial ice, at 80 Degrees !!
The boys made it up to the about 7,500 feet to the Muir Glacial Fields by 1:00, where they rested, celebrated, and continued to reduce the weight of the cooler.
The Ubiquitous "Hall of Shame"
Being environmentally conscience, Mike and Bone saved all their bottle caps from their beers in the rental car's ash tray, or as it has become fondly known as over the years as the "Hall of Shame."
Yep ! You guessed it Raining on Rainier !!!!
There is an old saying that the boys made up that day. "Too much Hall of Shame, makes it Rain". The continuous depletion of the Hall of Shame cooler on the hike up constituted a frequent, and often urgent need to fertilize the surrounding shrubbery with a nitrogen-based excrement on the hike down. Please note Bone (pictured below) is "inputting" (with beer in hand), while "outputting", thereby maximizing his experience.
Mike and Bone: Bringing the "Grunge" to Seattle !!
With Mt. Rainier "conquered" to the boys satisfaction, they decided to tour Seattle. Thinking it would be "cool" to hang out by the Space Needle they drove to the Space Needle's neighborhood to find a hotel for the evening. Upon finding their ubiquitous "sleep cheap", the boys walked around only to find out that they landed in the "Porn" district, with all the sleazy peep shows. The boys not finding the area morally bad, just boring decided to head over to the Waterfront District for some mischief. In the Waterfront District the boys found a wide diversity of eclectic bars and their first introduction to coffee shops, of course in true Mike and Bone fashion, they tasted at least one of the "fruit of the grains" (beer!), at every local tipplery establishment, and ignored the coffee !!!
Browsing the Bar District for Micro-Brews!
As day drifted into night in Seattle the boys kicked up their partying from crazy to insane, with an ever-increasing number of different brews and ales that were poured out of the barrels, and into the gullets of our hapless heroes.
Sleepless in Seattle
As with any adventure with alcohol; the more that you imbibe, the more boisterous one becomes. This is especially true in the adventures of Mike and Bone, which led to a near unfortunate incident.
Whoa Cowboy !!!. That evening in Seattle's night-life district there were numerous members of the fair sex walking around partying like the boys. Being this was pre-grunge period some of the women still wore their hair in Mohawks and dressed in post-punk fashion, which prompted Mike to shout out sometimes coy, sometimes crude, fashion comments. Unfortunately some of Mike's comments offended a self-proclaimed "cowboy" from Alaska, who asked Mike to step outside for offending women (that the cowboy didn't even know "its general principle pardner!!"). This was more than ludicrous since they were all outside. After a few tense "toe-to-toe" minutes, the not-to-bright cowboy began to realize that not only was Mike not intimidated, he was also out-numbered 3-1 not by fellow cowboys, but three guys from Detroit. As his common sense began to prevail he wisely slunk off into the streets leaving a very bewildered trio who decided that since they were heading up to Canada the next day, that heading to the hotel at 2:30 AM wasn't a bad idea before they met more "cowboys."