The Beauty of a Car Camp

I've decided there isn't much more life can offer than the glow of the dying embers of a campfire in its last throes. I love camping. I don't know what it is, whether its the escape from the humdrum and boiling life down to its necessities, or playing make-believe of times when life was simpler, but camping just relaxes me.

In recent years, I have not been able to spend nearly as much time as I would have wanted traipsing through the alpine highlands with a backpack full of freeze-dried food. I've come to a new and interesting phase in life where I can finally share these excursions with a coterie of the people who matter the most to me: my little family.

So, I moved from proving and testing my masculinity through grating tests of endurance in the backcountry to s'mores and ghost stories in a tent trailer. At one point in my life, I looked with great disdain on "car camping" and thought little of those who would not "earn" their place to sleep by wearing out the soles of their feet to get there. Now, with my children all asleep and worn out in their Bratz and princess sleeping bags, I have finally gained a love for the beauty of a car camp!

We've made our way to Sequim, WA to camp. We used our spot here at the KOA Kampground as a base camp to visit Sequim and Port Angeles and enjoy the simplicity of small town living. While just in this KOA, there is plenty to do with swimming, mini-golfing and relaxing, we ventured out and made our way to the Dungeness Wildlife Reserve to have a picnic. After a short walk down the easy trail, it started to drizzle. We stopped just short of the descent to the beach on Dungeness Spit at an observation point that was sheltered from the rain by trees. We had our trail lunch and waited out the gentle rain eating bagels and cheese and playing pirates.

When the rain quit, we made our way to the beach to play in the sand and enjoy the surf pounding in. There truly is nothing as beautiful as watching your kids enjoy the sand on a beach in the Pacific Northwest!

On the way back to the KOA, we decided to visit the Olympic Game Farm, which was quite the adventure. The kids loved having animals like yaks, buffalo and elk come right up to the car. They did not know what to think about those particularly pushy animals who put their snouts right through our open windows. At one point, there were simultaneously elk at my window, Kerri's window AND the back window of our van...each pushing their heads as far as they could into the car, trying to get some bread from us! It freaked the kids out a little, particularly Kaija! These were HUGE elk, whose LEGS were nearly as tall as our van!

Probably the funniest part was when Kerri allowed a big buffalo to get close enough to her window before giving him bread that he stuck his TONGUE through the crack in our window where she was! Who knew that buffaloes has such long tongues!?! I let an elk get close enough that I put bread right IN his mouth! Of course he wanted more and I had to roll the window up and almost got his lip in it! :)

The kids really loved the bears too. Each of the bears staked out their own little section of the paddock to sit by the roadside and beg for bread. Several of them even had little tricks that made them crowd favorites. One could actually request more food by waving at you! Another would sit back and "smile" at you. It made them seem so cute and cuddly. It's hard to believe they are really such dangerous creatures and the only thing between them and us was a short four foot fence and a few strands of electrified wire!

After this it was back to camp for a dinner of bratwurst and roasted marshmellows! Then, the girls actually put themselves to bed! This is a phenomena the we only see when camping. It is either really fun to them to sleep in the bags, or camping really tuckers them out. Either way, the net result was an evening where Kerri and I could peacefully gather our thoughts by the campfire without wondering which kid is going to trip and fall into it!

What a day!

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Liam's FIRST Birthday!

Happy Birthday to Liam...what a BIG BOY!
Well, we have this tradition to give our babies their first taste of REAL dairy on their first birthday.

Uhhhheeemmm, now that I think of it, I think Liam has had a taste or two of the forbidden substance courtesy of my dad, Grandpa Cook. For some reason he thinks babies are deprived and feels the need to give them tastes of all sorts of goodies including caramel, frosting, soda, etc. So I'm sure this is not Liams real first taste of ice cream, but it is the first cone he got all to himeslf and he knew just what to do with it!

There are some things in life where a lesson on "how to" is just not required. Eating an ice cream cone is one of them!

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