Day 8 - Pentiction to Lake Chelan

He Said:

I had some good things to say today, but I always write too late I find it hard not to write something like this in point form. It's not easy to inject narrative, but I have to step up my game, I hear Shannon is kicking my butt. Today was a great day.  It started out well. Ordered the free business breakfast that came with our suite and was asked how I like my eggs, then they attempted to get $7 out of me for them upon delivery, on the premise that the 'girl is in training'. Too bad, so sad (did I just write that?). Not my problem.  They had the chance to take them back and declined. So - free eggs! That makes up for the sneaky way they used individual loose sheets of paper instead of notepads, to thrwart any would be notepad collectors. I can't believe it was $7 for those eggs. Then we had a long series of unfortuante incidents with the kids, were apparently we were making them be grumpy.  Just can't win sometimes.  It's like we're punishing them by taking them to the beach.  Apparently the private beach at the hotel was not so great, unless you like broken beer glass in your feet.  So it was off to the beach with a quick stop at LocoLanding, which turned into a long stop.  The kids had a ton of fun there, at $5 a pop.  There were the bumper boats, Mara and I in one, GIllian in the other, Mom on shore.  Seemed like every kid there, not just mine, enjoyed soaking an adult.  Or a nerd? Not sure. Thankfully having Mara there bought me some protection, I think. It was very laid back.  There was a giant inflatable slide called Spider Mountain for some bizarre reason (and I owe Shannon $50 for betting her she couldn't explain why), that had no visible way of climbing it.  The kids loved that, and spent way more than their 3 trips climbing up and riding down it.  Then there was what can only be described as juvenile jolly jumpers, rounded off with trampoline basketball. We got some great shots of the trampoline basketball, it looks like theyr'e swimming. As soon as I have an internet connection that doesn't drop every 2 minutes, I'll add them to the gallery. Hopefully tomorrow.

After that we 'let' GIllian choose McDonald's for lunch, and then it was off to Lake Chelan, Washington. We made more than a couple stops, then got there around 5:30 to find it was booked through the week. Which I'm ok with. We took a tour of it afterwards and other than perhaps two stalls where you park on the street and walk up, it's pretty much a parking lot.  We went further up the road to 25 Mile Creek, which they warned us was a smaller site, a jumping off point for boaters.  That not great. The sites were small, no privacy, backing on to a road, and full of anthills Given the time we decided to make do. I had started to set up camp for the night while the girls were in the washroom, when GIllian came running back to tell me to stop.  Apparently the woman's single toilet washroom had a sink full of puke that looked and stunk like it had been there a while.  They tripped around to the men's room, but it had no water.  So we decided to make supper there, then head back in to town.  During supper we had almost convinced ourselves to stay, and that's when the cache of frat boys and girls showed up. I say frat boys but really, none of them could possibly be smart enough to be in university. The river next to us blocked out most noise, but after the third of fourth person with a red beer cup wandered through our site to look at the river, we decided to call it a night.  Back into town we went and, about 9, ended up at Darnell's Resort.  Seems like a nice enough place.  Fairly basic motel, hot as heck, but two rooms, great view of the water, and a cabana full of games and activities.  The plan is to spend the night here and use the internet to make plans for tomorrow, but given how bad this internet is, I'm not having much luck connecting to anything.  Perhaps in the morning when I can go out on the balcony.

Today was a fully 14-15 hour day, and I loved all of it.  It feels like we were at LocoLanding two days ago.  The kids enjoyed LocoLanding and had some cute moments. Mara made sure we asked for a room that didn't have barf in the sink when we got to the hotel and when we crossed the border to miles instead of kilometres and I said to Gillian "they measure things differently here", her response was "how, with their hands?" We've also been collecting band and album names based on phrases as we go. So far we're forming the band "Throw another egg on for Ryan", with our debut album being "Cheaper than Cheese". That'll be followed by 'Drawing Dark Faces".

Overall, we're officially one week in and so far so good. I check my blackberry occasionally and my stocks but, on the whole, I have managed to avoid thinking about anything back in the real world, and it already feels like 2 weeks. I hope it continues to go well. Part of my clever plan for going to Lake Chelan was that perhaps we could then do the coast, then Oregon then maybe a boardwalk on the ocean in California because they kids have always wanted to see it and before you know it, boom, we're in Disneyland. But I'm starting to warm up to the idea of doing it next spring break. The kids are still a touch young. Mara only just yesterday went down a tube slide without being too scared. And today she was scared again.  And it is amazing the things kids will be impressed over.  Gillian was in charge of the Do Not Disturb sign today, that was her baby. And the fights over who gets to bush Ryan or turn the hotel key. The campsite had a rock with a hand print on it. I tlooked like someone had sprayed a splash of black paint around their hand, and that's probably the one thing they'll remember today. 'Look at that! There's a hand on that rock!" and Mara with her "Mom, I have a surprise for you, come see." It was the best thing ever, judging by them. 

All in all, an awesome day. I can't really complain. I'm thankful for my family, and thankful we can afford to handle incidents like, say, a campsite being full or possesing puke-plastered porcelain sinks. Oh, Ryan's been great too. He likes to mimic any shouting I do, be it to tell the kids to be quiet and go to bed, or to come down the slide. He's definitely getting repetitive in using the same sounds, they just still may not be the right ones.  Big changes coming, I tell you.  Camping's a bit hard for him, with no room to crawl around, but he's handling it well.


She said:

I was falling asleep last night to the sound of Brad's fingers clicking the keyboard.  It's a constant hum that is easy to fall asleep to - he's amazingly fast.  He doesn't use the "correct" fingers on the keys - I think he uses his pinky for the Shift key only - not the A, for example.  It was quite mesmerizing and worked better than my crossword puzzles for putting me to sleep.  I have nothing more to add to the narrative or yesterday.  I'm sitting on the balcony - much better internet access - in the early morning.  Lake Chelan is quite the resort town.  Lots of condos and fancy cottages and yacht clubs.  Ahhhhhh  - where's my coffee.