Beach part 2

We woke up bright and early after our first night of camping at Ocean City State Park. Jay and I laid in our sleeping bags and listened to a brief rain plink onto our tent roof. I was relieved when the moody rain fly held up and did its job. After a short 20 minutes or so, the rain moved on, the girls woke up, and we rotated through the get-dressed, visit-toilet, eat breakfast morning routine. A highlight for the kids was eating Hostess mini powdered sugar donuts from a small $1.88 bag they had picked out at the grocery store before our trip. It’s the little things.

After breakfast, we made our first of three trips to the beach. We drove the mile or so to the parking area by the beach path to save our energy. The trail leading from the parking area, through the grassy sand dunes and wetlands, to the beach was still plenty long enough–about a third of a mile–so we got plenty of walking in.

During our first beach time of the day, we built a veritable medieval fortress of a sand castle and splashed around in the waves. It was cloudy and a chilly 60 degrees or less. There is something so cleansing and peaceful about a gray misty Pacific Northwest beach in the morning. Rose was much too cold to even consider getting her toes used to the freezing Pacific water, so she bundled up in towels and watched us from afar. Amber and I enjoyed wading in the small rivers left behind by the tide because they were warmer than the big ocean.

For some reason, our vast smooth stretch of beach had no tide pools or even any shells washing ashore, but there were crabs. It was the seagulls’ breakfast time, and they feasted on the supersized crabs that washed ashore, pecking them into bits. We kept dodging assorted crab body parts swishing back and forth in the waves. Crabs must be nutritious, because those seagulls were massive. We stayed until lunchtime, then trekked the long sandy hike back to the car and drove back to the campsite for sandwiches. We could have packed a picnic, but I’m not a fan of sandy sandwiches, plus the closest bathroom was at our campsite, so it was good to take breaks from the beach (Amber ended up needing me to dig her a cat hole to relieve herself before we left the beach for lunch).

After lunch the kids went into the tent to relax and play (in other words, engage in a massive, epic tent-shaking pillow fight) while I slumped in the front seat of the van and dozed for an hour or so behind the blissful almost-quiet of closed doors. Amber had woken up several times throughout the night, cold or something and I was feeling it. So I dozed. Every now and then a particularly loud squeal or shriek from the kids roused me from my stupor. Eventually the sun came out and we drove down to the beach for an afternoon of sand dune exploration. The sand dunes were covered in long rubbery grass, with patches of the softest white sand. Every time we walked down a steep sandy dune, the ocean’s roar disappeared behind the dunes and it was warm and quiet. When we came out on top of the next hill, the ocean’s sound and stiff breeze blasted us again. I enjoyed the contrast of sensations between hill and valley.

We spent another couple of hours exploring and sitting in the sunny sand. I showed Rose how to make a Zen garden. Jay built a scene from mythology with random sea debris he collected. Amber picked flowers, dug in the sand, rolled in the sand, and jumped down the sand dunes. I sat on the warm sand and wove a basket out of that tall thick grass. It was a very peaceful lazy afternoon. We drove into town to refresh the ice in our cooler, and drove ten minutes to check out North Jetty, which is on the tip of the skinny peninsula that creates Grays Harbor. North Jetty turned out to be another beach, but a public, easy-access beach which made it dirty and crowded and far less inviting than our pristine coastline a few miles north. So we left pretty quickly and drove back to our campsite to fire up the charcoals for an early dinner.

After dinner, it was another trip to the beach, this time all the way down to the water. Then back to the tent for sleep by 8pm. After the kids were ready for bed and zipped into the tent, I sat in the car and called Jeff to chat. Amber was already asleep by the time I crawled into the tent a short while later! She even slept through the night, which helped me sleep better. One of my least favorite times of day to handle solo is bedtime, so my plan to come to the beach while Jeff was out of town worked wonders: the kids got tired enough to pass out immediately and spare me the drama of evening scuffles, needing to find that one stuffed bunny, needing to get one more drink, etc.

Saturday morning, day 3, we were all feeling quite tired. We drove to the beach but right when we parked, it started drizzling, so we turned back and went back to the campsite, where the rain stopped and we put away our tent and packed up our gear. Then we made one last trip to the beach before hitting the road. Everyone was lethargic from our long active previous day, so the kids decided to play in the dry sand with shovels and our bucket. Mostly, however, they sat there and asked me for snacks. Then Amby pooped her pants. When Jay and Rose started playing “hide the shovel” and forgot where the shovel was hidden, I knew it was time to hit the road. Plus, a dark cloud was rolling in from the ocean. So I urged the kids to dig faster and find that shovel, then we made the slow sandy hike back to the car one last time. Halfway there, a fine mist started spritzing, and it got darker. By the time we were on the road, rain started in earnest. It was the perfect end to our beach adventure–we were too tired to really play at the beach anyways, so mother nature gave us a nudge towards home with a handy rainstorm.

Noteworthy: Jay’s fever never returned, although I did give out ibuprofen like candy on this trip. Single mamas need children operating at full capacity! I took ibuprofen before entering the tent for bedtime both nights. There’s nothing worse than lying awake in a tent with a tired headache! We drove 2 hours and 15 minutes to my parents’ house in Bonney Lake and crashed there to await the upcoming family reunion. Jeff arrived from his trip at the lake house late that night.

• Waiting for the girls to wake up. I love quiet early morning tent time.
• Breakfast.
• Beach, round 1
• The kids discovered that the sand needed to be packed firmly to be dumped out in a smooth bucket-shape, so Rose took over stomping it down while Amber shoveled sand in. They had a whole system worked out: Amber shoveled and every 3-5 scoops, Rose would stomp it down. It took a long time, but they were so happy and cooperative, I was happy too. Jay took charge of designing the castle and building the walls.
• Happy cooperative play without arguments: my favorite!
• Jay went historic with his design, with a central tower in the middle of the fortress, “as a last defense if the outer castle wall is breached,” he explained matter-of-factly.
• Castle complete! My contribution was adding parapets to all of the towers.
• The next order of business: freeze in the water! Amber was jumping for joy, curls bouncing.
• Rose was not so sure about toeing the water.
• Jay waded right in to those stormy gray waves.
• Poor thin Rosie was so cold, she went back to our chairs and burrowed into towels while the rest of us waded.
• Beach river: I’m sure there’s a more official name for these watery swaths.
• Easily ten degrees or more warmer than the big ocean.
• Amber’s curls adored the wet sea breeze and sprung into perfect ringlets. Dreamy!
• Seriously, the crabs were bigger than my size ten foot.
• Shivering Rose. She did not believe me when I suggested that if she got up and ran around, she’d warm up.
• I checked Amber regularly for signs of hypothermia, or even just too-coldness, and when we hiked back up the beach, she came willingly to her warm towel and jacket.
• LUNCH with the mosquitoes. I forgot bug spray.
• Back at it, to the sand dunes.
• Pictures don’t really do justice to the ups and downs of the dunes.
• Picking flowers. She would pick a handful of blossoms (no stems) and then present the crumpled fistful to me with a cheerful “here you go, Mommy.”
• Zen garden number one: Rose and I designed it together.
• Jumping down the steep sandy hills.
• Zen garden number two: Rose designed it by herself. She loved the treasure hunting it took to find all of the pieces to her design.
• My basket: I wove a flat mat of grass, then braided the ends and gathered them into a bundle on top so it was kind of like a hanging bird’s nest. It took forever, but it was a calm relaxing interesting activity to occupy my hands while the kids played.
• Climbing rocks at North Jetty: I curtailed this activity quickly, because giant boulders are dangerous with slippery sand all over them, and the last thing we needed was a broken bone or some stitches.
• Waiting for dinner was hard.
• Smores!
• The reflections were incredible at the beach after dinner.
• Where does the sky end and the beach begin?
• Foreboding yet beautiful.
• Saturday morning, day 3: I slept in my full-on 20 degree rated mummy bag in the 50 degree night air. I always need extra warmth to sleep. Heaven forbid we ever camp somewhere that gets colder than 50 at night!
• Ocean City State Park was a great place to camp! Minus the mosquitoes, of course.

15 minutes into our drive. My work here is done.