We had a nice day off of school, girls worked and sold perler beads, and we explored the state parks and beaches nearby a little, and finished with a movie night.
A little different morning routine today as I was the only one who needed to wake up early as I had a work call. I kind of enjoy my quiet time in the morning so I can just have my coffee and do my stuff alone, quiet and in peace :). Bella woke up not much later than usual though, so she had breakfast and went on her iPad, then Bia woke up a little after her… so I was not alone for too long. I got some work done, had my call, worked on some posts and was all done by late morning.
Carol and the girls were working on beads, making different things for earrings or necklaces that the girls want to sell. They worked on that stuff pretty much all morning, and early afternoon. Bia eventually walked around the campsite and was able to sell a few to a couple that is staying near us, and got $5 on her first sale. They got super excited, and so did Carol. Carol was very excited about the fact they made the things with her by hand, and went on their own to sell, and obviously I was too. Once Bia came back, Bella decided to join her and they were both walking around the campground looking for people who were hanging out outside to offer their hand crafted designs, it was very cool. They were able to sell one more to a girl nearby as well and got another $2.
When I was done with work, late morning, I went for a bike ride and took a right on Cape Arago Road, which basically takes me to 3 state parks that have some awesome views, beaches, a botanical garden, a reef, tide pools, etc. I decided I wanted to bike all the way to the end, and check out places on the way back, so I could at least see all the places first. It was about 5 miles to the end, with some up and down hills, but mostly easy riding, though the up hills would have been too hard for the girls.
The ride is very nice though, and it feels like you’re going through a mature forest… well, you are. I kept driving towards the end, as the road loops at the end, and comes right back towards our campground. As I was getting close to the end, I started hearing some noises, which sounds like some dogs barking. The more I rode, the louder the noise got, and I could hear more and more animals were doing it, until I could make out that the sounds was from Sea Lions, or Seals. It didn’t take long to arrive at a Reef lookout point, and see maybe hundreds or Sea Lions on rocks right in front of the lookout. They were loud! I took some pictures, stayed there just a bit, marked the spot to return later and continued the ride. I soon got the the loop that turns around, so I was at the last park.
That place has awesome views of the ocean, with its cliffs, and sun shinning on the water. I tried checking out the look out spots there and tried finding any trails I could see. There was a trail that went down to the beach, a very nice beach, kind of secluded and protected from big waves, so I went down, pushing the bike.
It’s a bit steep, and the trail is not wide enough for a person and a bike, but I made it work, it was a good workout going down, and even more going back up. Hahahahaha.. Once I got down there, I found a place to leave the bike and went exploring around. Lots of rocks and forest debris near the shore. It was warmer at this time, and I felt this was a great spot to come back later with Carol and the girls. Took some more pics and decided to make my way back, so we could all eat lunch and go back together, and explore the rest.
I biked back, grilled some burgers for lunch, we ate and…. Carol and the girls were just slowly moving, they were hung up doing the beads. I kept nagging them to go, and while that was going on the weather changed, the sky got covered and it looked like it was going to rain. I kept bugging them, and eventually around 3pm or so we left to go check out those beaches. My plan with them was the same as with my bike ride, go all the way to the end, and explore from there back.
We stopped at the Reef with the Sea Lions first, and the girls loved it. We had the binoculars, so we could see all the animals easily and there were hundreds, they were piled up on rocks, some were sleeping, like they had just had a huge meal. It looked like every rock in that area had animals on them. There was a guy next to us that started telling us about the area, what to look for, etc. and he mentioned you can see whales in that spot, and soon enough we saw one. That was cool. We could only see a dark body coming above the surface a little, then water shooting from a hole and a few seconds later it’d disappear. That was cool to see.
From there we went to the last park, Cape Arago, and went down the trail to the beach. We walked around, climbed on rocks, and walked pretty far on the rocks near the water, looking for marine life.
We saw quite a few things, snails, small crabs, plants, etc. That was very cool, and we spent a good hour there. The girls already said they want to go back 🙂
Bia really likes to check out all nature stuff.
From there, we started the drive back and were stopping at every trail we could see. We would go down to the water areas, walk on the rocks, look for crabs and such… it was very fun. Everyone had a good time checking out the trails and the beaches.
Bia likes to explore, so she wanted to check out every little side trail that was off of the regular trail. Bella is a little more afraid and prefers to stay in the main path.
It started drizzling, so we decided to go back home. When we got back, Carol went inside to do some cleaning and I took the girls to the beach to see if we’d see any crabs. We had a nice walk but didn’t see any crabs.
We got back, showered, had dinner, cleaned the kitchen. and watched a movie. It was fun night and after our movie we ended up watching the rest of Schitts Creek and then went to bed quite late. Glad tomorrow is Saturday!