Little Owl Cabin at Mt. Rainier

03/12/2026

They say you shouldn’t fall in love with something that can’t love you back. We learned that the hard way with six cedar hot tubs. 🪵💔

For a decade, the cedar tub was our most treasured amenity. It was also the trigger for countless nuclear tantrums. As many of you learned, they’re perpetually fussy. We spent nine years in a cycle of hope and heartbreak, diagnosing and patching every possible point of failure. (There are MANY!)

Ultimately, we learned that no amount of electrical, plumbing or mechanical genius would get our cedar tubs to a steady state of reliability. This relationship was irreconcilable.

So, last summer, we gleefully dismantled our last cedar tub and let it go—literally—in a blaze of glory.

From those ashes, we set out to build The Hot Tub That Would Not Break, and it seems like we succeeded. Days out of service since June 2025: Zero!

At least as important as reliability: Materials.  An “off-the-truck” model constructed of fiberglass would never do outside of the suburbs.  But rocks and hot water, a la hot springs, literally adjacent to National Forest: Hell Yes!

Full disclosure: Our new new hot tubs (yes, plural) are not entirely natural.  But the look, feel, vibe and experience are in total harmony with the surrounding forest.

AND THEY WORK! Come soak it in! 📸

11/19/2025

November is “clouds at eye level” season, when Rainier, Adams and the other high peaks are rarely visible below 10,000 feet. But Packwood hardly lacks for breathtaking scenery this time of year. Moody days like these are ideal for lowland forest bathing, waterfall-peeping, mushroom picking, or taking in the Palisades, just a few minutes outta town.

11/13/2025

Little Owl was built in 1976, and in our choice of materials, colors, decor, we’ve tried to make it look like 1976. The creative brief: Vintage Vibes, Modern Comforts.

Our new workstation is a great expression of that ethos. Escaping the present has hardly felt more urgent 😔, but when you have to reconnect, we’ve got you. The new workstation we built over the summer is thoroughly retro when you’re off-the-clock, and reassuringly modern when it’s time to plug back in. Dell 27” 4K monitor, laptop stand, ring light, keyboard, mouse, ergonomic Steelcase chair: all check!

11/10/2025

A black monolith in the middle of the living room? Nah!

We ditched the black box TV, hung a discreet pull-down movie screen and added an Epson HDR projector that’s always bright and sharp, no matter the ambient light.

Cold and wet outside? Just turn on the fire and binge to your heart’s content.

11/06/2025

05/15/2025

Marmot is on the market! This cabin has brought us, and many of you, a lot of joy and happy memories since 2018. If you’re in the market for a Packwood cabin, come take a peek at Marmot during our open house, this Saturday, May 18, from 11:00 to 3:00 PM.

For more info, contact Chris Murphy: [email protected], or 360.918.6497.

04/19/2025

As many of you know, life kinda kicked us in the teeth…er, head, last year when Val suffered a hemorrhagic stroke.

It’s hardly a stretch to say that she cheated death. Waiting even another 30 minutes to rush her to the hospital likely would’ve been fatal.

The crappy thing about a stroke is that it can take on ambiguous expressions. Val had been sick for several hours, and something about this looked a little different to me, but stroke never crossed my mind until she fell out of bed. By then, she was in seriously critical condition.

Thankfully, the all-volunteer Packwood Fire Department arrived in light speed to spirit her to the first of what would be three hospital stops. We’re profoundly grateful to them, the heroic physicians at Harborview who saved her life, and our friends in Packwood who stepped up to keep the lights on during Val’s 11-week hospitalization.

Time away from Packwood has given us a chance to reflect on our business. Truth be told, we were feeling overwhelmed by the property management burden for five cabins well before Val’s stroke. (Spoiler: STRs are NOT passive income!) We were delaying a long list of creative directions we wanted to explore just to keep up. It felt like the right time to lighten our footprint.

Val’s stroke made that decision a lot easier for us. We love our cabins, meeting guests, creating experiences, but it’s time to dial it back some. Marmot is currently on the market.

Little Owl (the OG) will be our first, last and only cabin for the foreseeable future, and it’s getting a big refresh in the next several weeks. We couldn’t be more excited to make it happen and share it with you all.

Sincere thanks to all of you who sent heartfelt expressions of love and support. Things were totally scary and chaotic for a few months—and things are still a bit precarious—so I couldn’t possibly respond to all of you, but please know that your messages were read and received with the deepest gratitude.

Finally, get smart on the signs of stroke—now! They’re sneaky, scary and fatal, and lest you think you’re too young, know that the type of stroke Val suffered occurs most commonly among 20- and 30-somethings.

12/28/2024

Pine Marten, in full winter garb.

A cedar sauna, cedar hot tub, and trails from the back deck that run for miles into the National Forest make this an ideal winter retreat for up to 4 guests.

05/18/2024

The question of if/when/how to represent ourselves as the faces of this business, and share everything from the extraordinary to the banal about our day-to-day, has always found a single conclusive answer: hell no!

We’re proud of the spaces we’ve created in this gorgeous corner of the world, but we’ve never kindled any wishes to be social media famous ourselves. Most days, we’d rather chew glass than put in the hours to rank on Instagram, let alone primp and coiffe for the camera.

That said, we’ve chatted with enough of you all by now to know that our journey into this funny little cabin racket is at least minimally curious. Insofar as it makes us accessible to more of you good people, we’re down for a formal(ish) introduction.

So, howdy! We’re Ryan and Val. Gen X’ers, NYC refugees, 17-years married, former civil servants and non-profiteers. Val, born in Queens, was an affordable housing developer in the Bronx and Seattle Chinatown. Ryan, born and raised in Tulsa, OK and educated in NY, worked in public policy, managing disaster relief programs circa 9/11 and Katrina, then pivoting to green buildings and energy conservation before a professional mid-life crisis drove him—naturally—into renovating cabins in Packwood.

This business and our residency in Packwood often seem too unlikely to be real. We’re just city kids who took a few vacations in the mountains in the early-2000s, then got to thinking about an alternative out-of-office lifestyle. Even after we renovated our first cabin here in 2015, Packwood seemed about as natural a home for us as the ice rings of Saturn, but after a few years of full-time country life, we feel like we made some pretty good choices.

We’ve hosted 4,000+ reservations since we opened our doors in 2016. If you made a maintenance call, or if we happened to be at the cabin as you were checking in/out, then we’ve probably met. If you’re one of the 30 or so annual return guests, then we’ve almost definitely become friendly. It’s been a sincere joy getting to know you all.

We’d love to hear from the rest of you all. “Ask us anything” in our story, or just send us a DM!

11/18/2023

The problem with DIY, if you keep at it, is that your freshman efforts inspire varying combinations of dread, panic and shame. ⁠
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My friends and our guests tell me they don’t see the warts in my early work. That’s a relief! But I still see them, and they drive me bat$ #*t crazy. ⁠
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This bunk room at Little Owl is a case in point. It earned us a feature in , which was totally rad and unexpected. Structurally, that bunk was more than sound, but the finish details were atrocious. I had to make some corrections, if only to help me sleep. ⁠
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And here's the refinished product! For at least a few years, or until my skills level up another notch, this finally looks to me like a bunk room worthy of a page in Cabin P**n.

11/17/2023

You’ve arrived at Pine Marten.