Category: Trip Report
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Baker Lake Trail, Southern Terminus, Trip Report
Last week Gabriel had state standardized testing to endure. By the end of the week we were all feeling frazzled and ready for a hike. Luckily our friend Jessie was able to join us. The weather looked iffy, but we hoped it would turn out to be not too wet. As we were packing the…
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Low Tide Beach Walk
Puget Sound has abundant beaches, providing place to explore wilderness in the midst of the city. Back in my previous life (before Kids) I worked as a park ranger for the Edmonds Parks Department. One of my duties was to lead beach walks for groups of school kids and the general public, and provide education…
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Volunteer Park Conservatory
We don’t always have time to go on day-long hikes, but we have so many wonderful resources in town we can visit to immerse ourselves in nature. One such destination in Seattle is the Volunteer Park Conservatory. We went there a week ago as a family. It’s situated in a wonderful glass building, reminding one…
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Moran State Park, Orcas Island
All week we had been debating on where to go for our Friday hike. The weather looked good, but there is still so much snow in the mountains. None of our ideas inspired us. No one felt like climbing a mountain; we didn’t want to go anywhere we had been before. We flipped through the…
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Sugarloaf Mountain
Gabriel has had it in his mind for a few weeks now that he wanted to climb Mt. Erie near Anacortes. We’ve driven up it several times, and we can see it from many of the places we like to go on a whim. Because he kept mentioning it (and saying that he’d like to…
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Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge
Grandma and Daddy joined us recently for a trip to the Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. On the drive down, it was pouring rain, but when we got there the showers let up and we were mostly dry. We started out looking through the Visitor Center, enjoying the displays about the estuary. They have some models…
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Mercer Slough Nature Walk
We’ve been stuck inside a lot this winter, with yucky weather and yucky colds. My kids have both been begging to go hiking, and once they were starting to feel better we took a little walk down at Mercer Slough. We parked on the east side at the Environmental Learning Center, a newer building that…
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Flower and Garden Show
(Note: This post is heavy on photos. The lighting there played tricks with my camera, so the quality is not what I would like on many of them. I did want to try to convey the breadth and depth of what we saw, so I hope you bear with me on this one!) Each February,…
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Padilla Bay Shore Trail
We went up to Anacortes 2 weeks ago to check out the Padilla Bay Shore Trail. We had been having our normal February week of sunshine in the middle of our gloomy winter. We were also recovering from colds, and wanted an easy, gentle outing. This trail fit the bill. We stopped first at Bayview…
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Narbeck Wetland Sanctuary
At the end of the day today we finally got enough things done that we were able to sneak out of the house to enjoy the last of the light. We went up to Everett, right next to the Boeing factory, and visited a neat wetland there. It’s a good place to go to…