Catchin me an Orca

The San Juan Islands could easily be one of the coolest places I have ever been. We truly loved our time there and wished that we could spend much more there as well! So, our summer in Seattle was drawing to a close but there was one last trip that we wanted to do and had to squeeze in! Like, we did it the weekend before we moved haha. But it was awesome! Rusty took Friday off and we left Friday morning and drove to Anacortes to catch the ferry to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. The islands are made up of 172 named islands, but four main ones that have ferries. They are San Juan, Orcas, Shaw, and Lopez. We drove on Chuckanut Highway and stopped at Larabe State Park. The park actually stunk really bad, but the views from the drive were beautiful :) We got to Anacortes and ate some lunch at a cute Greek restaurant, and then went to the grocery store to buy some raw chicken so that Rusty could use it to catch a crab haha. That was his main goal before we left Seattle and it hadn't happened yet (he ended up eating the chicken for dinner that night haha). After that we drove to the ferry and there was, of course, a long wait. So we parked the car and went down to the beach. Rusty was out wading in the water when all of the sudden he starts freaking out because he is so close to a big crab! He did it on purpose though; he followed it out into the water with the intent of catching it... it didn't go well. We rode the ferry (one of the most beautiful boat rides ever) and finally arrive in Friday Harbor, a cute little town. We didn't spend any time here though, deciding we would go straight to find our campsite and come back a different day. Our camp site was right on the water and offered canoes for free so we set up and then went out and explored. Seals kept popping up right next to us and I was pretty sure I was in heaven. Watching the sun set out there was beautiful.

Chuckanut Drive

Waiting for the ferry!

Rusty's crab

Playing on the ferry!

Our camping spot. With really loud neighbors haha.

This weird fog came in over the water so we got off, but it didn't do anything to us at our tent. Weird.

The next day we woke up and took the ferry over to Orcas Island, where we were leaving to go kayaking and hopefully find some Orcas! I wanted to see one so bad. When we got there the guy told us that there had been a mistake, and there was no guarantee to see anything like that. But it was still so much fun! We went around between the islands and saw lots of cool starfish. My favorite thing that happened was that Rusty and I saw a tiny baby seal and paddled over to it. I almost started crying because it was just laying there and I was sure it was dead. Then all of a sudden, it put its head up, made a weird little squeak (I swear his eyes got big!) and then went underwater. We looked and a few feet away he popped up with his mama. Too cute! I loved it. Anyways, we did not see any Orcas but it was still a blast. We got back and then hung around on that island exploring a street fair and getting some bread from a bakery that we heard was good from an officer that we met that morning. We met him when we went up to this castle/fortess thing with an awesome view of the islands. Then we put up our hammocks and read in a park while we waited for the ferry to come back. By the way, there were a thousand bunnies running around! It was crazy! That night there was a meteor shower, so Rusty and I stayed up to watch it. It was beautiful. Being there right next to the ocean with the stars falling down was awesome.

Mt. Baker!

Delish bread.

Bunnies!

The next morning we drove straight to Whale Watch Park and set up camp. Not literally, but you know what I mean. We went over by the lighthouse and put our hammocks up. I was not going to leave until I saw some Orcas, and we were supposed to have a pretty good chance because one pod was going North and another was going South so between the two we should see them. I just sat out on the rocks looking for anything moving out in the water. AND THEN. IT HAPPENED. BEST DAY EVER. Both of the pods came together! And there was a baby! Now, they were pretty far away so I could only see the fins but it was amazing. I was so happy! We sat and watched them for a while because they just were hanging out in the same spot. I loved it. There was also a little English family there that made the day hilarious. "Not bad, what else?" haha. After that we drove around and saw some different views of the island and then went to Friday Harbor to walk around and shop and eat ice cream. Then sadly it was time to go home. :( We definitely weren't ready to leave that place, but we will be back again!

Paradise.

I know they are small, but you can see two fins in between those boats!!

Miracles Unseen

So, I had the day off yesterday and it was an uncharacteristically sunny day here in Mukilteo so I went down to the beach to read. I set up my little area and, after reading for a while, sat up and just watched the waves and the ocean. I started to think about my life and where it had taken me, my plans with Rusty, goals, and life in general. As I was thinking I was looking out at the ocean when I saw a seal!

Now, I love marine biology (I love everything about the ocean) and even though I have seen a seal almost every time down at that beach by our house I still get so excited. I looked around at the completely packed beach to see the reactions of everyone else, but nobody else had seen it. I was kind of confused because it was the closest to shore that I had ever seen, and there were so many kids and parents there that I was sure one of them would have seen it. But nobody had. There were a lot of seagulls out there on the water as well, and I'm sure that they simply thought it was just another seagull. Something ordinary. They missed the miracle.

I looked back out at the seal and watched it slip away under the water and thought about how that happens in our lives. If we are not looking for something, we can completely miss it. I started thinking about little miracles that have happened in my life that I might have missed: finding a house to buy that was perfect for us, finding a good job in Provo, finding good jobs here, finding housing here, Rusty's internship, my sister Beckie moving back home in record time... There are so many. It would be easy to simply call these things coincidence or just plain luck, but I know that they are something more. God gives us what we need in our lives, and also more than we need: He will give us miracles, the seals in the water, if we are looking. If not, we may pass by some of His greatest gifts and blessings.

Camping on the Peninsula? Sure.

Another adventure that we did while we were living in Seattle was going out onto the Olympic Peninsula to camp for a weeknd. We decided to just look around at a few things over there and then just go for it; stopping where we wanted to and staying where looked good. So Friday afternoon we took off and drove to Edmonds to take the ferry over there, but we got stuck in CRAZY traffic and had to just sit there for a long time. Finally we got on the ferry and then were able to park the car and walk around, be outside in the ocean breeze, and see the peninsula getting closer and closer with those beautiful, tall snow-capped peaks. When the ferry got there we unloaded and started driving… west. We stopped to eat at this really cute little old fashioned diner in Skagit, a tiny town that boasts a mighty fine lavender festival. We were able to see the lavenders while we were driving on the highway and it really was beautiful.

After eating there we kept driving and then decided it was about time to find a spot to settle in for the night. We had all of our camping gear so we started looking for camping sites, and found one called the Dungenous Spit. I think I had read before that it was a cool place but had no idea what it really was, so we decided to give it a shot. And luckily we got the last remaining camp site there. Which was great. We set up our tent and then walked through a cool forest path that just opened up to a view of the ocean and a cool spit with a lighthouse at the end. We hiked down to the spit and walked around for a little while, the whole time being blown away by the wind, and just looked at how pretty everything was. One of the craziest things was that it was kind of foggy and then all of a sudden we see this HUGE shadow coming towards us out of the fog; it was a cargo ship! But it looked just like a pirate ship full of ghosts out of a scary movie. We got super lucky just happening upon this spot and later found out it is one of the highlights of the peninsula! Woo hoo!

Well, we spent the night there and then the next morning we set off again. We drove through Port
Angeles and stopped for a while to go down on the docks and see the street fair they had going on. We even ate some delish gyros!

 Then we kept driving until we got to the Hoh Rainforest. Now I don’t know whose genius idea it was to camp in a RAINforest… but we did it. And although wet, it was AWESOME. Everything was so green, honestly a hue of green I didn’t think existed in nature. Like neon green. Everywhere. Trees, moss, bushes, logs, everything. We got there and set up our camp again and then went on a few hikes. We saw some GIANT trees and a lot of green, and then ended up a really cool river. We had a squirrel friend named Chip that kept us company. He stayed really close to us the entire night while we were sitting by the fire and eating our food. Funny little Chip. Well that night we did get rained on. Lots of rain. But luckily for us, we stayed pretty dry inside the tent. We woke up the next morning and everything was covered in snails and slugs though hahaha, including our tent. I was not a happy camper about that.

The drive was so pretty!

See what I mean about the neon-green?

These trees were so huge!

Trying to climb over the top...

This was our camping site! It was perfect.

This was our squirrel friend Charlie. He stayed with us all night.

 Sunday we went to a random ward and then drove on the awesome Highway 101. We passed through
Forks (everything was covered in Twilight things) and drove past La Push, an actual Indian Reservation.

 When we were driving we got to the westernmost tip of Washington and I started seeing ocean. Real ocean; not the Sound like I had seen all summer. And it looked a whole lot like Seaside, Oregon (one of my favorite places in the world) and so naturally we had to stop. We found the first beach pullout, called Ruby Beach, and drove into the parking lot and hiked down. And man, was it beautiful!!! I fell in love instantly. It was similar to Canon Beach (another favorite) in that there were these giant rocks right down in the tide, creating awesome tide pools. I saw lots of starfish, anemones, and those little butt looking things… I don’t remember what they are called haha. So we played at Ruby Beach for a while and finally, sadly, we had to leave.

I was SO excited when I saw this!! Ah!!

Tide pools

So beautiful!

Highway 101!!

The rest of the drive home was still beautiful though, and this time we drove down to where the peninsula meets the mainland and came across through Tacoma. The traffic was crazy (AGAIN) so we stopped for a while and went to a pizza place (maybe CiCi’s?) and chilled there for a minute, stuffing ourselves full to the brim. Then we went home and had to set up all of our camping gear again to let it dry out from being rained
on the whole night before, but came home happier and wetter than when we had left.