Campout 2012

Well, we all survived. Our 4 night camping trip on the Oregon coast was a success. We all had lots of fun! We had gorgeous weather the first 4 days. Lots of sunshine and blue skies. The beach was perfect with super soft sand and not too much wind. It really was about as good as it gets on the Oregon coast!
On Wednesday we packed up and headed out. Our van was super loaded down! We had our bike rack hooked up, which really saved a lot of space. It did make the back end pretty heavy though. We actually scraped our driveway when we pulled out. That was the only mishap we had. After getting camp ready and eating a yummy pasta dinner, we headed for sunset on the beach.  The kids also had a great time exploring the surrounding trees for "secret hideouts".
All Neil wanted to do was run down the middle of the road. This continued the entire time. He would just run and run and run. We ended up putting him on time outs in his car seat. It was great! He would totally relax as soon as we got him strapped in. Poor kid would scream his head off while we corralled him, but would just sit happily once he got in the van. Whatever works. 

On Thursday we took it easy. The girls went out on the boat with both Grandpa's and Aunt Bree to catch crabs. We went on lots and lots of bike rides. Neil loved to be pulled around the campground in the trailer. We saw deer all over the place which was fun. We were able to get really close to this one here. They must be acclimated to people. She wasn't easily scared off. Of course we also spent time on the beach. It was funny to see Neil react to being barefoot in the sand. At first he refused to walk in it. It took quite some time for him to warm up to the idea. He would crawl around with his feet up in the air. Eventually, he decided that it wasn't so bad. Chris got his fill of making lots and lots of fires.

  

Friday was probably the nicest day that we had. We spent the day on the beach making sand castles and playing around with the freezing cold water. Chris and I, along with his uncle Troy got to go crabbing with my dad. It was beautiful out on the bay! We saw seals and plenty of crab. It was both Chris and Troy's first time crabbing, so it was pretty fun! Once you grab the rope, you have to pull without letting up in order to keep all the crabs in the ring. It is a bit of a workout. They even made me do it a couple of times. It was pretty heavy! We were able to pull up quite a few crabs, unfortunately, most of them were either female or too small to keep. We got 5 keepers in all. We brought them back to camp to boil up. It was a perfect day!

  

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 On Saturday the weather was noticeably different. It was still dry, but the clouds had come in and it was cooler. We had plans to all jump in the ocean, so we waited until 2pm and all put our swim suits on anyway. We all went in! At least I went in to my knees...that counts right? Chris and the girls went all the way out, and said they had a blast. That water was freezing. So cold, that it made the bones in my feet hurt just to stand in it. Oh well, they seemed to have fun. We also buried all the kids in the sand. Besides having sand in all places, they really liked doing that. Nothing a warm shower wouldn't fix.

Chris and I went on a fun bike ride that day with his brother Calvin and his fiancé Jill. We rode up to the small town of Manzanita. It was pretty quaint and had all sorts of shops and bakeries. It was fun to walk around. It reminded me a lot of the seaside towns in Ireland.

It started to rain on us while we slept on Saturday night. It was so fun to hear the rain hitting our tarp through the night knowing that we were perfectly dry. I'm glad we were prepared for rain. Unfortunately, the rain continued the next day, so we woke up and had a pancake breakfast and then took down camp to head home. We of course stopped in Tillamook on the way back for some ice cream. It was a little hectic because Chris's brother and his wife delivered preterm twins late Saturday night, so everyone wanted to get back and go visit them in the hospital.
Considering everything, we all had a really good time camping! I can't wait to do it again. Hopefully next time Neil will be a little more cooperative.