Grand Adventure: family, house building and travel, Pacific Northwest style
Jack and I went away for a week on our own in mid June for an early 10th anniversary celebration. My parents generously stayed at our house with the kids. By this point we were fully vaccinated, but still felt that a simpler trip, close to home made the most sense for us, so we drove to the Olympic Peninsula. Here are 10 things we did.
1) Sunday - we lucked out and caught the ferry from Edmonds to Kingston with only a 5 minute wait and walked 6 miles on the Olympic Discovery Trail, along Lake Crescent. We did a short side trail to see the Devil's punch bowl. We stayed in a cozy, little cabin near La Push.
2) Monday - Our most ambitious hike was 13 miles up Mt. Muller (3350 ft net elevation gain). We saw one person leaving the parking lot as we arrived an no one else for the whole 8 hours it took us. Before we were engulfed in clouds we saw a bit of the spectacular views that motivate the trail. It was hard and we were still learning (again?) just how far off out smart watches are when it comes to hiking distances. At three separate points we though "oh there are just five miles to go", first from believing Jack's watch and them from misidentifying a landmark rock described in the guide book. The last bit was nice and flat and I'm proud of myself for doing it. Getting back to the car at 8:15 pm meant that dinner was tricky. Luckily the grocery store in Forks was still open so we bought a frozen pizza and some other supplies and ate dinner in bed.
3) Tuesday - We took it easy and walked 4 miles (total) to Third Beach. We found a log big enough to string up our hammock. It was sunny.
4) Wednesday - It was a very rainy morning when we checked out of our cabin. By the time we got to Kalaloch beach at noon it was sunny again. We did a short walk (2 miles) along the beach and then drove on to Lake Quinault Lodge. The trails just behind the lodge were surprisingly nice and we walked another 1.5 miles and ate dinner at the lodge. Everything was still take out style so we ate most dinners outside and breakfasts in our room there.
6) Friday - Quintessential Olympic Peninsula rain arrive on Friday and we hiked 3.5 wet miles along the east fork of the Quinault River with quite a few other people. Back at the lodge we swam in beautiful indoor pool again and played a great board game called Seven Wonders Duel, which we've only played three times in four busy years. I won :)
7) Saturday - We left at 7 am to get back for D's last baseball game, since Jack was the coach.
8) We read aloud Piranesi, the new book by Susanna Clarke.
9) In a stroke of good fortune, just before our trip we learned that a TV series had been made from the book Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, also by Susanna Clarke, so we were able to buy and download it before we left good internet access. We both read the book about 10 years ago and then over the past six months or so we listened to the audiobook together for a second read. Clearly it's a good book and the show was done very well.
10) We enjoyed time together without work (mostly), kids or much cooking and we slept!
I hope this title is appropriate and there are no other contenders for a 2021 heat wave.
This forecast is pretty close to what happened in the last weekend of June. I think the overnight lows ended up being about 75 for a few nights, which is higher than the average high (!!!) and meant that even when we opened the windows at night, the house barely cooled down at all. The kitchen reached 99 degrees and the penthouse was 105. The outside temp was 100 degrees at 10:30 pm. We assiduously tracked temps on different floors of our house and closed and opened windows strategically. We even papered over some windows. The hottest temp I saw in the basement was 79, I think. Our bedroom was in the low 80s in the morning and reached 91 on a few days.
We stayed home most of Memorial Day weekend, and finally tackled a home maintenance project we'd put off for several years. The air intake for house goes through some filters (MERV, I think, and not HEPA). Jack specified a filter box accessible via the powder room ceiling, but the contractor proposed a cheaper box and we agreed without realizing that it entailed access from the side rather than from below. So they put in that box and then blocked the access to it with the spiral stairs to the roof. Oops.
We had to cut the railing of the stairs in order to open the box and then the panel of the filter, which swing in different directions. We opted not to try to put the railing back together in a flimsy and temporary wat and just put a separate rail on the wall instead. It looks odd, but the stairs don't feel any less stable.
This picture of our neighborhood, shared by a neighbor, from August 1969 is just too interesting (to us) to not share.
In February we put in a little sweet bay tree, next to the box leaf azara we almost killed with transplant shock back in August. Both are looking pretty good now.
On the roof our irrigation system is ship shape and the raspberries finally look like they are going to earn their keep.
Over the long weekend we had a nice bike ride with our friends on the Chehalis Western trail. We started from the Monarch Sculpture park in Tenino and rode northwest for about five miles before turning around. The sculpture park was full of interesting art and an abundance of gongs and bells.
From there we all drove to Jack’s grandma’s house in Shelton. We visited and shared GG’s first Thai food meal and then we grown ups got to play pickle ball and the kids stayed up late and had s’mores.
The next day we hung out by the lake and while it wasn’t warm enough to swim it was perfect for paddle boarding and wasn’t even crowded like I suspect every park near home probably was.
I’m too tired to think of a good joke about paddles!
On Valentine's day, we had more snow fall in Seattle in a single day than any day in the last fifty years. First we had a dusting on the 12th, then snow during the nights, loads of snow on the 14th and yet more snow on the morning of the 15th. Snow that I shoveled in our shady alley didn't completely melt for 6-7 days and two days ago I saw small pile of snow in Volunteer park, a whole month after this epic snow storm.
For the first time ever, we actually went sledding on the hills immediately around our house. Here are some pictures, including the amusing melting pattern around our neighbor's leaking skylight.
We planned an AirBnb getaway in Sequim over President's Day weekend, and happily had made reservations starting on Sunday instead of Saturday. We kept expecting the snow to stop falling and start melting on Sunday so we didn't leave home until 4 pm, and even then we had to do significant shoveling to get out of our parking spot and to turn down our hill before getting to the major, plowed roads.
We've had some mixed luck with AirBnBs lately but this one was great and was just as described. It was un-cluttered, kid safe and also kid friendly, meaning that there were some toys and a big yard with a big toy that we used a few times. Jack and I went in the hot tub every night.
Originally we'd hoped to bring our bikes but it was too cold so we scaled back and very much enjoyed the under-scheduled time. We went out to the bridge over the lower Elwa river (as soon as we left Sequim there was still snow on the ground) and checked out some eagles, walked and scootered around Sequim Bay State Park and hiked in the Dungeness National Seashore, which we last visited when I was pregnant with D. We also played Settlers of Catan for the first time with D. Three nights was enough to relax all the way.
