Ah, Spring....

Cousins having fun at the park

We just returned home from a wonderful spring excursion to the great Northwest. It's a long drive, nearly 1000 miles, but we so enjoyed visiting with family and the spirit of adventure. We left in blizzard conditions and were forced to drive very slowly. Visibility was very difficult and we thought it would take us days to arrive. Fortunately it started clearing a couple hours into the trip and we made up lost time. We stayed the night after waking at 0400 and 15 hours of steady driving in Anacortes, Washington. That night, right across a small harbor from our motel, the Tesoro plant blew up killing several people. We didn't even hear it due to exhaustion but were shocked and saddened watching the news in the morning.

We awoke very early again and caught the ferry to Sidney, BC, Canada. We were concerned that they ferry ride would be canceled because of 70 mile per-hour winds. Fortunately it wasn't but it was quite an exciting trip across the strait. With beam seas coming off the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the ferry rocked and creaked sideways back and forth and the horizon would completely disappear. It was hardly possible to walk and the boson came over the intercom asking that we not try. Kelsey slept and Josh became a bit fearful. But I loved it and was comfortable being back in the San Juan islands where I lived throughout the '90's. I'm certain it is the most beautiful region of the world.

The ocean breeze was plentiful and the kids had a great time flying kites

We had a nice family reunion and kept busy visiting museums, seeing movies and going to parks. We all ate way too much but who can complain about that? Seeing the Hubble telescope movie at Imax was one of the highlights.

At the Royal Museum of British Columbia

On the way home, we had a front tire blow out in our van on the freeway at about 80 miles per-hour. We had a dear friend die in a van with a rear-tire blow out at only 45 miles per hour so we are very, very thankful to tell about it. Thankfully it was on a straight section and not on one of the many passes we'd crossed already and it was still daylight and not snowing or raining at the moment. We came home to another two days of blizzard conditions but enjoyed our time away with flowers and green grass.