Washington Coast 2014

This spring my parents bought 5 acres of land on the Long Beach Peninsula in Washington State. They are up in a little town called Oysterville. It's a tiny little town that sits at the top of the peninsula. The family property sits about a mile from the pacific ocean and a 1/2mile from Willipa Bay. Mom and Dad will start building their retirement home on it in the next couple of years. Since everyone was anxious to see it, we planned a family reunion for August.
We left SLC on Friday and made it to Boise that night. We stopped at ShashoneFalls just outside of Twin Falls on the way. We had never seen the falls and decided to use a little time to see them

 It's a 15 hour drive to Oysterville, and somewhere in my mind I for some reason was thinking that boise was a little under the 1/2 way mark. Not so much. More like the 1/4 mark really. It was a long drive with the three littles. They were troopers, but that 15 hour drive turned in to more like a 19 hour drive with all the potty brakes and sanity stops and by the time we made it to Astoria Oregon, we were all done. So that last hour from Astoria to Oysterville was a tense one. But we finally made it that evening and we set up camp.

Brooklyn Greeting Layla

Grampys mode of transportation

 My parents have named their land "Lex Haven" as tribute to our sweet Alex who loved the pacific Northwest with her whole being. Her ashes were spread on Oswald West Beach in Oregon because she loved the area so much.

 A few different views of the property.

There are lots and lots of critters on Lex Haven. Here are a few of them we found...

As soon as we were set up and fed, we headed down to the beach. We couldn't wait to get to the ocean! We got there just in time for the sunset!
It was cold and windy, but do you think that stopped the kids from getting soaked? No way!

 On Sunday we went on a walk and Bike ride down to the Bay, through the old cemetery and through the historic district of Oysterville. I so loved this old town feeling.

Later that day we headed in to Cape Disappointment State Park. It's about a 25 minute drive from Oysterville. There isn't much close to where we were except the beach and the bay, so we did a lot of driving to get anywhere else we went.
We played for a while on Waikiki beach. The water there was ICE cold. It literally was so cold that your feet ached after standing in for a few seconds. Still didn't stop the kids. Or Jeff for that matter.We tried our hand at flying kites, but the wind was a little too gusty to have much success.

After the beach we hiked to North Head Light house. The kids loved all the light houses in the area!

The next day was rainy, but that didn't stop us from heading over to Leadbetter State Park. We did a couple mile hike that lead through some cool forests and out to the beach. The kids had a great time!

Later that evening we drove in to Long Beach which is the major tourist town on the peninsula. We walked the board walk and the chops. The Deer here were really friendly and were eating these tomato looking berries off some of the bushes right off the walk.3

 
On Wednesday it rained all day. Jeff went deep sea fishing with Ken and Brecken that morning and they came home with a cooler full of salmon. No one took any pictures with their fish. Phshh. Guys.
We put on our rain coats and went back to Cape Disappointment to hike to Cape Disappointment Light house. The area was absolutely gorgeous. I felt like we were in another world.

 Kailey's family arrived late on Wednesday. So on Thursday we headed in to Oregon to hit Oswald West state Park.We had a blast playing on the beach.

A couple of years ago a bunch of my family members took a trip here to Oswald State Park to spread the ashes of Alexis. This was her favorite place in the world. While here my brothers both bough a giant gummy bear in their favorite color. Nearly two years later Andrew still had most of his. So he decided to bury it in a tribute to Alex.

The headless gummy bear

They all took turns taking a bite (Gross)

Then they buried it on the beach

They made a little marker for it and wrote "Sing a Song:"

Then they all started screaming "For Alex" and took off like a bunch of wild freaks in to the ocean.

Those boys are the life of the party for sure :)

After we left the beach some of us went in to Astoria to see the Astoria Column.

Friday was our last full day in Washington. We all decided to go horse back riding in Long Beach. We had so much fun! I've really missed riding a lot. Maddie had so much fun! This was the first time she had gotten to ride a horse without someone leading her. Cricket is still a little too spunky to just let her go off alone on her.

After Riding we headed back to Lex Haven to pack up some stuff to take to the beach down the street. We ended our vacation that night with a bonfire on the beach and grilled up some salmon and roasted hot dogs. No one wanted to go back that night knowing that we were leaving in the morning.

We were all sad to see our vacation come to an end, but had to start heading home on Saturday. We had a wonderful time and look forward to making many more memories on Lex Haven and the Washington Coast.

Our drive home was worse than the drive there. We blew out a tire on the Columbia River hwy just past Multmonah Falls. That delayed our trip a few hours. We had pulled out of Lex Haven at 10:00 that morning and didn't make it in to Boise until Midnight. It was a looooooong day.

We were glad to be home finally. But Max asks everyday when we can go back. I think I'm ready too!!.......