Our Incredible Trip to Port Angeles

In the NW, you have to be a vacation planning maniac to nail down the perfect weekend of weather. Every morning, with out fail, I wake up and check the weather for the next 10 days to watch for windows of great weather........which sometimes are few and far between.

When I saw an upcoming GORGEOUS one, we loaded up the car and headed out for Port Angeles area for some serious play time. We stayed at the Olympic Lodge and of course, hit the pool the minute we got there. (I mean, the ONLY things kids care about in a vacation spot is the pool and jumping from bed to bed in the hotel room, right?)

Morgan had some serious progress in her swimming courage over the three days we were there. We were all pretty excited for her.

The next morning, we drove up to Hurricane Ridge. The skies were crystal clear and the views were phenomenal.
We checked out the visitor center and planned a little hike.

Peyton checking out the views.

We also listened to a little talk on cougars, and learned they can jump 40ft!!
The girls waiting for us to head out on our hike.

Besides the incredible views, we were shocked to find deer EVERYWHERE!!! Including some baby deer.
It was a first for me to see a deer squat to pee. Really? I've seen a lot of deer in my life, but never have I seen one squat. I thought they just kind of stood there. Pretty funny.
We did just a short hike from the lodge, about 1.5 miles to the top of a peak with 360 degree views. This is looking back at the lodge as we are leaving. SO pretty!!
Baby deer!!
Just after we left on the trail, we heard there was a bear sleeping on some snow a little ways up. That was all Deaven had to hear to take off way in front of us to find it. He's quit the little hiker.
Morgan making her way up.
Here are the kids at the top enjoy views in every direction, including to Canada.
The whole family!!
Oh, and yes, we found the bear sleeping on the way up.
The trail was still covered in snow in a few parts, but nothing we could pass over.
Heading back down.
It was one of those times where it's so pretty I felt like I should keep taking pictures, but you can only take so many. The combo of wildlife and views was pretty awesome.
We met one kid (that we wanted to strangle) who kept running up on the deer and scaring them away. We spoke of Jason fondly the rest of our trip. :)

Just one more squatting deer. I love the people walking in the background and the deer looking as if she thought she'd never get some privacy.
After some swim time, of course, we went into town to check out some things. There was "Arts in Motion" going on, which included huge sand sculptures.
They were pretty cool.
We also stopped at a huge playground for the kids.

The next day, we took a little drive and stopped first at Salt Creek (where we definitely want to go back to go camping). There were places you could walk down to a rocky shore line and check out a bunch of tide pools. We wanted to get there at super low tide but that was at 11pm. It was still very fun.

It was really beautiful!!
On this day, we also took the kids to the Sol Duc Hot Springs, where there are 4 mineral pools heated to various temps and then a HUGE freshwater pool.
More swimming time!!

We made lots more progress with the kids on swimming. Peyton learned to dive and front flip, Deaven learning to back dive and Morgan loved jumping in the 10ft area.
After a long swimming afternoon, we loaded the kids up on some protein (and chocolate) to make sure they could do our last adventure for the day.......a hike to a 90ft waterfall. Yeah, we like to pack it in.
Most the hike was pretty level through a forest and then super steep at the end. There were some HUGE trees along the way.

It was really, really pretty all the way through.
Morgan loves the bridges.
Here we are at the falls.
As we headed back into town, I was looking at the map and noticed that you can DRIVE out on the little spit of land that shoots out from Port Angeles, so we decided to go check it out.
Right after we got towards the end of it, we heard someone mentioned that there were Orca whales close by. We spotted them immediately and proceeded to watch them for the next 45 minutes.

It was crazy because they pretty much stayed in the same place, pacing back and forth for a long time. We could tell there was at least three, and one really big one. After a long time, they started heading right to us, getting closer and closer. We were so excited!! We realized quickly there were about 6 of them.
At the end of this post, there is an incredible video of when they were right in front of us. We even caught a few tale slaps and a jump on the video. It was incredible!!

The next morning after we packed out of the hotel, we drove about 25 minutes to the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim, WA. We've been here before a few years ago and it's definitely a family favorite.

It's one of those places where you drive your car through acres of animals and they come to your car to get fed with bread.
This picture makes me laugh!! Look at the difference in head sizes between the two!! Morgan was game to feed all the animals until we got to the buffalo area.......then she dissapeared to the back of the car.

It was funny too, because TWICE I got burped on, which definitely didn't happen on our last trip.
This always provides lots of giggles!! We got this bear to catch bread in the air (video at the end).


Will became very close with this guy. He ended up feeding him out of his mouth (video at the end).

After the game farm, we headed to Port Townsend to visit Fort Worden, which was right up Deaven's alley.
The coolest part of this place was all the gun batteries that are still standing. This HUGE one was like entering a haunted mansion with crazy dark tunnels, stairs, levels and places to climb on the roof. We could have spent hours playing.
We did walk down several of these tunnels that were PITCH black until we could go any farther. I couldn't believe Morgan was brave enough to go, but I loved that as long as she was with her family, she felt safe.
After this, we pretty much head back home. It was such a fun little weekend trip!!

Here are several videos from our trip that are pretty entertaining (though some are just for me, the proud Mama). The whale one and Will feeding the buffalo is definitely worth it though!