The Pacific Rim

Today started early when Ollie woke and refused to go back to sleep. The two of us escaped the tent into the cool morning air leaving the other five huddled in their sleeping bags snoring. I wiped the sleep from my eyes, threw my hair up in a bun and wrapped my babe on my back and embraced the foggy morning. The mist wet my face as we walked down the steps to the beach. The air was moist and cold and I could see my breath as we made our way towards the ocean. 

The tide was out leaving lots of shallow pools behind. I rolled up my sweat pants and dipped my toes in the water as we walked. The coolness of the ocean was invigorating and wonderful. I examined the uncovered rocks for sea life while Ollie pointed and babbled at the water and birds. We met many early risers as we walked, most of them very friendly and polite. We would exchange hello's, comment on the weather and go on our way. Ollie ended up falling asleep tucked on my back so I headed back to camp to get ready for the day. I brushed my teeth, properly combed my hair and started breakfast. The children emerged from the tent sometime after 8:00am and stretched and shivered at the picnic table.

Since the morning was kind of wet and dreary, we decided to hike Radar Hill. We had seen it on the side of the road the day before and thought we'd check it out! We got out of the van, put on our walking shoes and got ready to go. The littles scrambled up a rock face and declared that they had made it to the top! As Mr. Stannix and I walked over to the trail head we read the sign and laughed out loud. The hike was a total of 100m and would not take the whole morning like we thought! 

So we walked up to the top to meet the kids and admired the rather foggy view. We laughed at ourselves all the way down and when we got into the car Camilla laughed, "Whew! That was a hard hike. Do you think we could go out for lunch today?"

We stilll had a lot of rainy time to kill, so we drove over to the aquarium in Ucluelet. I had heard a lot of good things about it from friends. The kids were so excited about the touch tanks and loved learning about the sea life!

These sea cucumbers were pretty epic, and gross. The kids LOVED them! 

They could have held these things all day long.

By the time we made it back, the drizzling had stopped the skies were starting to clear. 

The kids asked to head down to the beach to dig in the sand. It was still a little bit chilly, but this guy was thrilled to be free from his carseat and crawling around the beach!

The water was cold but these two couldn't resist going for a dip...

After a few hours we shook off the sand and went up for dinner.

Daddy cracked open one of his special rootbeers to enjoy after dinner.

Joe can hear a bottle of pop opening a mile a way. He quickly crawled down from his make-shift tree house and asked for a sip. These two melt my heart.

Our camp site had a lot of old fallen trees that made the perfect hangouts. I would often catch the boys trying to solve their rubiks cubes up there.

We all enjoyed cups of hot chocolate and then made our way to the beach.

The light was stunning...and bedtime begs for long walks along the beach to tire children buzzing from cups of hot chocolate. We've had a week of tenting to practice putting five children to sleep and I think we've got it down!

We made it all the way to the other end of our beach before turning around to head back home. The older two kept drawing pictures in the sand with sticks and then Joe would quickly run over and stomp them out. Eventually they worked out their differences and we were on our way again.

And when little legs were tired, Daddy hoisted them onto his shoulders for a ride.

The fresh air and sand beneath our toes was good for the soul. Ollie was asleep by the time we made it back to camp. Everyone brushed their teeth and tucked into bed without a fuss. 

I'm going to miss this place.

Long Beach

The children woke early and jumped into my sleeping bag at different times for morning snuggles. We played musical sleeping bags all night and I warmed many feet on my legs and many hands on my belly. As they slept, I lay awake deep in thought and grateful for the chance to mother each of them. 

We ate a quick breakfast on the drive to Long Beach. The children ran across the sand with excitement and anticipation at the things they would discover today. The waves here come from all the way across the ocean and crash with more power and force than one can imagine. 

The morning fog was just starting to burn off and I had fun trailing behind practicing my photography skills and watching their faces light up at every turn.

The tide was just coming in and the waves chased our feet all the way down the beach.

Sometimes the children let the cold water rush over their feet as they followed Daddy.

Other times they ran away shrieking and giggling as if they were playing a game with the ocean. 

I was constantly finding Joe staring in the blue water as the waves rolled in, mesmerized by their power and force.

And then he would run to his next adventure on the beach.

There was so much to discover along the way. The children enjoyed learning about the different tracks left behind by snails, birds, and hermit crabs. We found crab shells, big shells, small shells...

We walked until we were too tired to walk anymore and finally found the starfish that we had been searching for. Holding a starfish was all that Hyrum could talk about at bed time for these last couple of nights. He was tickled to find so many on the rocks!

We waded through tide pools and touched the eneminies as they swayed and danced. 

Fin decided that it was fun to get his picture taken and look at the photo after. Each time he would look at it and say "Coooool! Do it again!"

We explored the rocks for probably a good hour, learning about the different sea life and searching for crabs.

I swayed on the beach with a sleeping babe on my back soaking it all in and capturing it as best I could.

It was the perfect morning.

Daddy finally found a star fish that would let go and Hyrum was super excited to hold it and touch it.

Soon it was time to make the long trek back to the van. The tide had come in quite a bit and the children were gradually getting wet as we walked. 

The walk back seemed to take twice as long and we were all pretty tired by the end. As we watched the ocean we were lucky enough to spot a harbor seal and the blowspout of a whale! The seal played in the waves next to shore for quite some time and the children laughed everytime it popped up for air. The island where we began was in our sights, and it seemed a lot closer than it actually was. The children were soaked when we finally arrived at the van and they were happy to jump in and warm up!

Finley fell asleep shortly after we returned to camp, his legs exhausted from the long walk this morning. 

When our sleepyheads woke up we drove into Tofino and walked around for a bit. We needed a few groceries and the kids wanted a break from playing in the ocean. They had a lot of fun playing at the park and watching the skaters at the skate park.

Ollie happily snuggled on my back in the Chimparoo as we explored.

We promised the kids ice cream and they were so excited for the treat! Finley fell off the picnic table bench a few minutes after this picture and his whole cone smashed. There was a lot of crying, but Daddy quickly grabbed him a new cone and helped ease the pain.

Ollie got to share with everybody else and loved every lick. After we were finished we went back to camp and attempted to do laundry for seven. I was glad that I brought my own detergent since we spent $12 on two loads (and they didn't even get that clean).

After the sun went down we started a fire to keep us warm while we visited. The air is cool and moist and chills you right to the bone after the sun`disappears. It was enjoyed by all, especially Hyrum who said, "Daddy, watching a fire and drinking hot chocolate is AWESOME!" Camilla came up with some pretty awesome campfire games and we all had a good laugh before bed.