the University of Washington almost completely owns the state of Washington. UW is in the largest city with pretty good weather, minus the rain, you can take a bus to downtown, which is about two miles from Seattle City Center which has a ton of stuff that college kids would love to do, offers just about every major you could want. Very, very nice campus as well. UW is about 30 min. from snow skiiing and a ton of other outdoor stuff. I think Mt. Ranier is maybe a little over a hour, hour and a half away.
If you lived in Seattle and wanted to go to Wazzu, it would take about 8 hours. You thought we had it bad before 25 was 4 laned? Pullman is in the far eastern part of the state, and you have to take two lane roads to get there. We're talking middle of nowhere. Pullman is in a desert, and they actually have a lot of students from Idaho, and they aren't very far from the University of Idaho. Like MSU, they are known for their engineering and I think Keith Jackson went to school there on the palouse. Even if you lived in Spokane, which is a pretty big town on the eastern side, it would be pretty hard to get to.