Orcas Island Day 2

Our 2nd day on Orcas Island started with an inspired hike. Husband looked at me the night before and said "Dao and I should wake up early (if you know my husband then you know I was giggling when he said "wake up early") and take a super hike, maybe even try to run it so we can get ready for soccer on Wednesday." And, stupidly I said "honey, we'll all go on a hike. Nothing too crazy because I don't want to carry kids and try to get through a hike myself. But, I bet they have family friendly hikes." Later that evening, we looked through our hike map for an easy hike. All the hikes are labeled there was a 0.25 mile hike and a 1.5 mile hike. When we drove around the next morning after breakfast, we decided let's do the 1.5 mile hike to Cascade Falls.


Nooo biggie. Just a hike. I packed water for the kids and their trail mixes. Denise did the same with her bag. We start and I notice it's straight up the first stretch. The kids (by kids I mean Dev and Nana) are already complaining...looking for walking sticks to support them. All the big girls were up for it. Once I get pictures from Denise, you'll see what I mean but let me tell you the 1.5 mile hike turned into an almost 4 MILE HIKE!!! The kids were so good on the hike. No complaining - they just worked threw it! We saw horses on the hike which was another thing that we want the big girls to do next year they'd love it! But poor Em got stung by stinging nettles the last stretch of the hike. So sad!! But as always she was such a trooper and hiked through the pain.

So, afterwards we ended up at the south end campsites so the daddies ran back to go get the cars on the north side because the kids (and ME!) were done. They jogged another mile (maybe a little less) back to the cars on the main road so they could pick us up.

We were starving by then our little morning hike peaked into a late afternoon so we ate a late lunch and went back down to Cascade Lake to let the kids play on the beach and wear their bathing suits. It was no means warm enough to step foot in the water but the competitive nature of my husband comes out and he announces at lunch "who ever goes in all the way gets 3 s'mores tonight!!" It was game on...

After lunch, we headed to town for to go get warm coffee because it was cold like in the 50s so we got coffee and came back to let the kids play. I didn't get pictures of them in the water because a) I was drinking my hot coffee with my hood on so I had no free hands b) I left it in the car with a sleeping Dev in it so I was not about to disturb him. All the kids dunked except for Pay because she is the smart one. She did however go up to her knees and she got 3 s'mores for that; we seriously couldn't see how they could do it. We were all wearing fleece and drinking hot coffee and were still cold!

The swim was short lived and the kids headed over to hang out with Dao. He is so great with the kids and they love fishing with him!! By then, my Mister woke up and was able to participate in his favorite part fishing. Chrissy, this is Cascade Lake which is directly below all the campsites they have paddle boating/row boats here. We didn't do any of it but you SHOULD! The view is amazing here.

Dao prepping the kids' poles for fishing.

Oops, sorry Nana - I cut you off on accident. The girls waiting for a bite...

Madi and Dev throwing rocks into the water.



Dao's fish he caught...which reminds me - Denise, did he throw it back in? Or is it home with you guys? I never saw it again and he said it was dinner!

The girl is fearless. She tried to climb over the rocks so she'd get a bigger splash!

All the kids on the docks fishing. Another little girl was standing by us; her parents told her to come over and get fishing lessons. When her parents told her it was time to go, she says to them "but I haven't had my turn!" Haley, Isa and Kay were like "who is she?"...I am telling you kids flock to our kids. Some one asked us in town if we were having a family reunion??

The view across the island. Even in overcast it's beautiful.

Husband took the little ones to the park and us, Mommies cleaned out our vans in preparation for the ride home + they were sicknast from the ride over.

It was so breezy and cold.

This is at our site. This deer was a frequent visitor. Apparently, the night before she was at our site at 1am trying to eat our bag of chips. Dao said she had the bag of Sweet Chili Rice Chips on her nose - it was stuck there!! Then, came back at 3am for more food. I slept through most of it...so I wouldn't know but kinda funny, huh? The animals (including the birds) were fearless and used to people. At first we were scared...Dao thought of the movie Are We There Yet? and their deer fight. But, they seem to be comfortable around people and are the campground pets. But we needed to keep our food in our container bins.

The kids running around our campsite. They had made up this game where the big girls were teaching Dev and Pay how to survive should they get lost on a hike. So, they all had their walking sticks playing this game. I just love how they can come up with games to occupy themselves and play all together.

**I have to run out to drop Isa off at a friends house and pick up Dev's friend for a play date...blogger wasn't uploading my video so I'll be back to post that later this afternoon.**