Long Beach USA

Last week we spent 4 nights in Long Beach, WA which is on the southwest tip of Washington State. We went with our travelling friends Ray and Ginny and their girls. We left the Lower Mainland in plus 30C temperatures and as we got closer to the coast, we met the ocean mist, which never cleared up that much for our trip. It was still fine as it was about 20C. We stayed in an a townhouse-type resort on the beach, although it was about a 100m walk to the beach. Long Beach's claim is that it is the 'World's Longest Beach', I meant to check to see if that was indeed the case, nevertheless it's pretty long at over 45km, I wonder if they have ever thought of making a marathon down the beach?

This first section of pictures is from our time at the beach. We all enjoyed the beach for different reasons whether it was for flying kites, making sand castles, running through the tide pools or taking a drive down the beach. Here are a few beach pics.

One day Ray decided to build a fairly large sand castle, the castle looked better from the other side, but the kids didn't look as good in that picture , so here is the back of the castle with the builder trying to make himself seen in the background.

We knew this before, but this trip reminded us just how much Kyle loved the beach, I am sure if we left him to play all day on the beach he would.

Keisha enjoyed the fact that the beach is dog friendly...

and we liked that it was vehicle friendly. It's pretty cool that they encourage you to drive on the beach, we each took a few turns driving on the beach. We also took turns flying various kites. Here is Kyle flying the Canadian fighter jet kite.

The kids also enjoyed the pool. With the kids enjoying the beach and pool, it reminds me of our Mexico trips, but perhaps not as tropical.

In Long Beach they have Go-Karts. The kids weren't old enough to go on their own, but were able to go with an adult. The guy running the track said I was driving too fast, why don't they just make the go-cart only go a certain speed? Anyway we all had fun with that.

We were browsing the shops and came across a hat store and got the kids to try on some hats.

After we walked out of the store and went down a half a block Aaron points out that he still is holding the glasses he tried on in the previous picture. We quickly took them back before anyone noticed. Afterwards we had an ice cream and Aaron just happened to sit in front of this sign.

One day we took a trip to Seaside, Oregon about an hour away. It's a nice tourist-type town on the Oregon coast where we spent a few hours looking around.

The kids took a ride on the train...

and Aaron and I went on the bumper cars...

and Kyle checked out the swings on the beach.

The swings seem to make Kyle happy but, nylons on his head do not...

or maybe they do!

Back in Long Beach there are some lighthouses nearby. Shelby had the camera for a while and took this shot. I should give her the camera more often.

Here are the kids hanging out near the lighthouse.

Later I took Madi out for her first geocache experience. She said it was her favorite part after swimming. A new caching partner in the making?

In the townhouse Ray slept on the couch in the living room and when the kids woke up between 6 and 7am they watched TV for a bit while Ray tried to keep sleeping.

While we were there it was Canada Day, we didn't celebrate that much, but Ginny decorated the place a bit 'Canadian' and made Canadian chocolate bars. They look yummy although, I never did get to try one.

We came home the day before July 4th, but while we were there Long Beach was getting ready for the 4th of July celebrations. Seems the tradition in Long Beach is to buy fireworks and drive to a spot on the beach and light your fireworks between 10pm and midnight on July 4th. Perhaps not coincidentally, July 5th is Beach Cleanup Day. Unfortunately we missed all this phenomenon, as most of Long Beach is booked for the US long weekend months in advance.

We has originally planned to spend the first week of July in Westbank, but the house there is undergoing renovations and unfortunately was not finished by the end of June as was hoped. Shelby found this place on Long Beach at the last minute and it turned out to be another great vacation. So a big thanks goes to my wife for making it possible, a travel agent in the making?:-)