Farewell Tofino

After a rather rough night of consoling a sad Finley, we were up and at 'em nice and early! The littles woke one at a time and whispered in the early morning light. As each woke up, we sent them to the bathroom and then sat them in the van with breakfast while we stuffed sleeping bags and folded up the tent. The family across from us was shocked at how quickly and quietly we packed everything up! They asked Mike what we did with our kids to keep them so quiet. I was glad it went so smoothly. We were pulling out of camp by 7:00am, ready for a long, long drive.

We stopped at Long beach for one last family photo before taking off. We took our family pictures here in 2010 when we only had Camilla and thought it would be fun to have a comparison from then to now. I failed to take the fog into account and was kind of bummed that we could see the ocean as clearly as I had hoped. 

We waved our last good-bye's to the ocean and headed for the Ferry on the other side of the island. The road on the way back almost had two of us puking and we had to pull over a few times for some fresh air.

Our star traveler was pretty excited to get out of his seat when we finally reached the Ferry! We had an hour wait for the next ride and there was a good chance we would have to wait another four hours after that if we didn't make it on. 

We let the kids watch a movie for a bit while we waited and then stretched our legs with a bathroom break.

Fin didn't want to walk much with his sore knee, so he opted to sit inside with Daddy! I took the others exploring out on the deck as we left. 

The older two got cold and hung out with Daddy inside while Joe and I walked the deck. I enjoyed spending time with this freckle nosed boy so much! We took turns taking pictures of each other and laughing as the wind blew our hair. I asked him what his favorite part was and he responded, "All of it!"

I threw snacks into the backseat as we drove and drove. I reflected on all of the things we did and learned this vacation and couldn't help but feel blessed to have these awesome kids and an amazing hubby to share my life with. As with any vacation, it had it's trying moments, but the good far outweighs the bad. It was late in the afternoon before we stopped for lunch and everyone ate every last crumb of their meal.

We finally made it to our hotel around 7:00pm and the first thing we did was change into our swim suits and jump in the pool! We spent most of our evening canon-balling into the water and swimming lengths. I bathed all of the kids before bed and even after swimming there was still a handful of sand in the bottom of the bath water. Mr. Stannix and I took turns enjoying a nice, hot shower and felt good as new after! We tucked the littles into their beds and called it a night, exhausted from a day of traveling.