Family Time in the San Juan Islands

Posted on October 7, 2013 by bottlingmoonlight | 1 Comment

Feeling a bit bedraggled, we were refreshed with the beautiful sunshine that greeted my parents as they arrived in Washington. Unfortunately, their arrival was met with phone calls from home informing them that my grandmother passed away while they were en route to visit us. This was not unexpected, she had been ill for some time, but it was incredibly sad for all of us and especially difficult for my parents to be so far from home. On the other hand, I felt fortunate to be able to be with my parents during such a sad time. Van worked hard to cheer them up and we tried to support them the best that we could.

I love you and miss you, Grandma. I look forward to putting many of the interests that we shared into practice when I settle down into a home with land to dig my fingers into. I feel so, so lucky to have had so much time with you over the years, and I am happy that you’re no longer suffering. Rest in Peace, Bertha Marie Duffie.

Although my grandmother’s death was never far from any of our minds, we were able to have a wonderful and relaxing week with my parents in the San Juan Islands. We did lots of cooking and eating, went on a few sunny hikes, spent some time staring at the water, warmed up in front of the fireplace, and spent many, many hours doing genealogical research.

Our week began with a ferry ride from Anacortes to Orcas Island.

Van Enjoying the Breeze

The Puget Sound and Mount Baker

Dad, Van and I explored Rosario Inlet.

We all checked out Orcas Island Pottery – Van especially enjoyed their multi-story treehouse.

Can’t forget the dance party.

It was an incredibly beautiful and relaxing place to spend time with family.

Upon our return to the mainland, we had some fantastic chowder and visited Deception Pass for a walk over the bridge to peer down at the green water far, far below. It was here that we said our goodbyes and traveled south to Seattle (for us) and to the airport (for them).

Thank you, Mom and Dad, for an absolutely wonderful week! We love you and miss you.

Wet, Chilly, and Gray: Olympic National Park

Posted on October 4, 2013 by bottlingmoonlight | 2 Comments

Lake Crescent, Olympic National Park

Wet, a little bit chilly, and gray. What a way to celebrate the end of summer! We spent the last week of August camping on the Olympic Peninsula in Olympic National Park. We got some hiking in and had a glorious time on the banks of Lake Crescent, but were otherwise bundled up in warm socks, sweatshirts, and coats at night and in rain jackets during the day.

Hiking in Olympic National Park

The Happy Family in Olympic National Park

After our night in Staircase, we headed up to camp at Heart O’ the Hills campground, which is on the way to Hurricane Ridge, the most mountainous part of the park that is accessible by car. We enjoyed some ridgeline hiking and the first real blasts of cool fall air. The real highlight of camping in this area was visiting Lake Crescent. The hikes nearby were a lot of fun, but just sitting and staring at the lake was the best part. At least for me. For Van it was probably the hours of rock throwing that he was able to do on its banks.

Hurricane Ridge, Olympic National Park

And from here our trip proceeded to get wetter and wetter. I guess that’s what happens when you head into a rain forest. We camped near the coast at Mora campground, in close proximity to a beach with great sunset views. The beach was beautiful, but the sunset was shrouded in the mist that marked all of our visits to the coast.

Washington Coast

Rialto Beach, Olympic National Park

Sea Foam

Rock Throwing is Not Limited to Lakes and Rivers

We headed inland to the Hoh Rain Forest, excited to explore the moss-covered trees and lush green forests. We put up our hoods and had one great hike through the pouring rain, but decided to cut our second hike short when the skies opened up even more. I like rain – I really do. But it’s hard to like it when you’re living out of a tent and you have no prospect of being dry at any point in the next couple of days. That being said, we had a great time playing games in our cozy tent with Van and listening the pitter patter on the nylon above.

Glistening Ferns

Our Site in Mora Campground, Olympic National Park

Olympic is a neat place, noted for its vastly different terrain – glaciated mountains, lush old-growth rain forests, rocky coastline, and sunny days in the Olympics’ rain shadow. Even so, between the wet and chilly weather (to be expected, I suppose) and a run-in with a less than savory character along the coast, I was for the first time on our trip, beginning to question how much longer I wanted to travel. But in the spirit of explorers who have come before, we pressed on, looking forward to five luxurious days with my parents in a beautiful home in the San Juan Islands.

Happy Six Month Anniversary!

Posted on October 1, 2013 by bottlingmoonlight | 4 Comments

Traveling by Ferry in the San Juan Islands, Washington

Six months. Six long, adventurous, exciting, and family filled months. I can hardly believe that it’s been six months since we pulled our green VW Eurovan out of my parents’ driveway in New York and embarked on the adventure of a lifetime. And here we are, six months later, living out of a different vehicle, clear across the continent in the damp woods of Oregon. My thoughts of having a place to call home, cooking healthful meals with a full indoor kitchen, and starting a garden with the little guy have begun to increase lately. We still have lots more to explore, but I’m equally excited about our post-travel adventures.

Instead of writing about more of the lessons I’ve learned (and there are many), I thought I’d share the best two pieces of advice or words of wisdom that we received. The first was from my former boss, a fantastic mentor and friend who completely understood our motivation to take this sort of trip. When we were discussing the ins and outs of our travel while we were still in the preparation phase, he advised me that when we got to the point in our travels that we felt like we were done traveling, we should continue on traveling for another month. By doing this, we’d really learn if we were done traveling or if it was a temporary set-back that was making us feel that way. As a result, we’d never look back and wonder if we stopped traveling too soon. Such great advice, not just for our travels, but for anything we’re doing that we’re thinking of stopping or changing. This advice has helped me get through the down periods (and thankfully there haven’t been many), when I can’t take another wet night in a tent or another day of trying and failing to find healthful food.

The second was less advice and more words of wisdom from a dear friend from law school. She grew up in a small southern town in an area not known for its intellectualism or cultural diversity. This did not prevent her parents from finding a wonderful, like-minded group of friends in their local area. She passed along their words to me as we search for a new home: no matter where you are, you’ll always find your people. I may be paraphrasing this a bit, but it’s been one of the most reassuring nuggets of wisdom that I’ve heard during our travels. It has enabled me to put less pressure on myself to find just the right place to call home. There are many “just the right places” or maybe none at all, but either way, we’ll find our people. And isn’t that the most important part of finding a place to call home?

Tour de Smithies: Olympia Style

Posted on September 28, 2013 by bottlingmoonlight | 2 Comments

Sarah and Me in Olympia

The Boys! Elliot, Emerson, and Van

Rolling into Olympia, Washington, we continued our pattern of staying with friends from my days at Smith College. Anyone who knows me even slightly knows how much I absolutely loved Smith and how much I love my friends from Smith. Apparently, the love doesn’t go one way. Our incredibly generous friends Sarah and Scott (and their lovely and energetic sons, Emerson and Elliot) invited us to stay for an extended period. They hosted us for a record eight nights. Yes, you read that right – EIGHT nights! They should be sainted.

Love these peeps!

It was so incredibly wonderful to have a bed to sleep in, a shower to use, access to laundry facilities, and to not have to worry about the weather. But more than that, Sarah and Scott are a walking party. Literally. We haven’t socialized that much since…I can’t even remember! We attended a total of four parties that week – and Sarah and Scott attended two additional parties (for a wedding) – so we were seriously not keeping up. It was such a fantastic change of pace. But, even better, I got to spend some excellent quality time with a wonderful friend who I haven’t seen in ages and her equally awesome husband. And Van had the chance to play with the big boys and all of their exciting toys. I think he was most excited by having a table to sit at that was just his size. Mental note for when we no longer live out of a tent.

Festivities in Olympia

Between the parties, we had the chance to check out a bunch of different places in the area. We hit up the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge and the Farmers’ Market with our friends, and when they were busy at work, we headed to Gig Harbor, Bremerton, Bainbridge Island, the Bainbridge Island Japanese-American Exclusion Memorial, the Foulweather Bluff Preserve at the northern end of the Kitsap Peninsula, and the Olympia Hands-On Children’s Museum.

Gig Harbor

Foulweather Bluff Preserve

Olympia

Japanese-American Exclusion Memorial

We also spent a day in Seattle exploring and were lucky enough to meet up with Sarah in the afternoon so she could show us around. On our very last day in Olympia, Sarah, Scott, and the boys accompanied us Staircase in Olympic National Park. We took our second hike of the trip with friends (the first with another Smithie and her son, Rebekah and Rhyer), and had our very first campsite visitors. So fun! It reminded me just how great it is to camp with friends. Something I hope to do lots of in the future. Any takers?!?!

Note the bench we found on our hike – we joked that it was a casualty of the sequester.

Bench in Staircase, Olympic National Park

Thank you Scott, Sarah, Emerson, and Elliot for an absolutely wonderful week. We miss you all already. Please come visit wherever we wind up settling down!!!

Van and Elliot

The Noble Giant – Mount Rainier

Posted on September 25, 2013 by bottlingmoonlight | 2 Comments

Our First View of the Sleeping Giant

Wildflowers, alpine meadows, gigantic old-growth trees, glaciers, deep canyons, waterfalls, snapped trees piled up to look like twigs for a giant’s bonfire, lush green forest floors, and I could go on and on. Mount Rainier was awesome! If someone told me that they were visiting Washington State and only had three days, I’d tell them to spend all three days at Mount Rainier – it was that amazing.

We spent our mornings hiking amongst wildflowers and through snow and our afternoons hiking amongst ferns and dripping old-growth trees. We relaxed on the porch of a lodge in awe of the giant before us, and counted our lucky stars we were able to find a great campsite in the popular park. Although this park doesn’t seem to suffer from the incessant traffic jams that others do (I’m thinking of you, Yellowstone), available campsites were hard to come by. Fortunately, we found a fantastic site under towering evergreens. The campground was filled with families on one last hurrah for the summer.

We ran into many experienced campers at the park, but two families stuck out. The first was a family camped a few sites away, between us and the bathroom. Each time I walked by, I marveled at the kitchen set-up that these folks had. Somehow, out of the back of a small pick-up truck, they managed to create a luxurious compound, replete with a massive tent and intricately overhanging tarp (necessary in these wet woods), chairs for the whole fam, a regular-sized sink complete with two 5-gallon collapsible buckets to serve as a water source and a graywater tank, a waist-high drying rack, a table for other important kitchen items, cords running all over the site with kitchen implements hanging within reach over the kitchen area, and a propane stove powered by a tank the size you’d have on your backyard grill. They win the prize for the most intricate campsite we’ve come across on this trip.

The second family outdid us all. While were out hiking for the day, Alan came across a backpacker with an eight month-old strapped to her chest. She had just arrived at a trailhead and was talking with other hikers. Curious about her story, Alan overheard her explaining that she had just been out backpacking for twelve days with the wee one. TWELVE DAYS! Backpacking! And it wasn’t clear that the backpacking was over for the happy family – they may have just been refueling. Sometimes people tell us that it’s impressive that we’ve been on the road camping with a two-year old for over five months. Do not be impressed! We have not attempted backpacking, we haven’t even camped for twelve straight days – we always tend to take a one night break (or sometimes more) every week or so. And we’re not camping with an eight month old! Our little guy can walk, can tell us what he needs, and can even help out quite a bit around camp. Twelve days. Backpacking. Amazing!

And so, amongst the backdrop of these extraordinary campers, we explored many nooks and crannies of this intensely beautiful park. The glaciered peak was as imposing as it was beautiful, and hiking up its flank amongst the wildflowers was a lesson in gratitude. Gratitude that we were able to see the peak on multiple days (a treat not granted to all park-goers given the common cloud cover), that we chose a time to visit when nature was showing off her finest colors, and that we were healthy enough to hike up, up, and up to see the massive glaciers that blanket the peak.

I’m not sure what was more beautiful, each individual wildflower or the mass of wildflowers dotting a slope. Regardless, lupines will always be my favorite.

The massive, wet trees were a significant change from our forays through the Rockies and the Utah canyons. Although the trees were impressive, Van’s favorite thing was to point out the ferns (which he calls “F F Terns”) and then turn over the fronds to let us know whether or not there are spores. He can barely walk by a fern without checking for spores, which made for lengthy forest walks given the abundance of ferns in the lower elevations of the park.