Yesterday, Christian, Crystal, Joy and I embarked on an adventure! Christian had been saying he wanted to be a dolphin trainer when he grows up, so for a special day I planned a trip to San Juan Island to the whale museum.
Here’s the itinerary as we originally planned it:
5:15 am Leave Lynnwood
6:45 am Arrive Anacortes
7:45 am Ferry to Friday Harbor
9:30 am Arrive Friday Harbor
10 am Whale Museum and misc sightseeing
1 pm check in at Roche Harbor – San Juan Safaris
2 pm Sea Kayaking – San Juan Safaris – 3 hours
6 pm dinner
7 pm be in line for ferry
8 pm ferry to Anacortes
9:20 pm arrive Anacortes
10:50 pm arrive Lynnwood
Surprisingly, we actually stuck really close to our itinerary. We left about 10 minutes late, but arrived in Anacortes on time. We had an expensive breakfast at the ferry terminal and re-bought the map that I had bought and forgotten at home in the gift shop. When we got to Friday Harbor, we found that the town doesn’t open until 10, so we walked around a bit, found the public restrooms, and went back to the whale museum at 10. The weather was ok… a little cold and sprinkly off and on all day long, but we had times of beautiful sunshine too. Gotta love WA weather!
The whale museum was fun. The kids got to play with sound recordings, which was their favorite part. They got to hear what different types of sea life sounded like as well as recording their own voices. They had various skeletons on display and Christian thought the preserved baby harbor seal was cool. We also watched a bit of a movie about a whale researcher. Admittedly, most of the time we spent at the whale museum was spent in the gift shop 
I picked up a couple of books for Christian and he and Joy each got a package of squeaky sea life toys (whales, squid, etc).
So from there, we played with the navigation in Crystal’s new van and had it direct us to Lime Kiln State Park. The scenery was beautiful. We even saw a fox on the way! When we got there, we had a snack and followed a trail to a whale watching spot and on to the lighthouse. It was a nice short hike, and it was Christian’s favorite part of the trip. I learned that Madrona is a kind of tree (silly me, I thought it was a community).
Then we headed on to Roche Harbor. On the way, we saw a beautiful bald eagle. I tried desperately to get his picture, but he was too far away to get a really good picture. When we first saw him, he was really close, though, so it was disappointing to not get a better picture. We also saw horses, cows, sheep, and alpaca on the way, and we passed the Lavender farm.
Roche Harbor is a tiny little place. You park at the top of a hill and walk down into the town. Kinda strange. Anyway, we walked down and stood in line forever to have fish and chips and chowder. The fish was fabulous. The chowder wasn’t really anything special. Before we knew it, it was time to check in for our kayaking trip. The kids had been really nervous about kayaking. They both insisted they don’t know how to swim and who knows what other arguments they had to not go LOL. We were a little worried at first, because the guy who checked us in warned us we’d be expected to keep up with the other couple that was booked on our tour, but thankfully it all turned out to be fine.
We got the full rundown of what to do, got suited up with life jackets and ’skirts’, got settled into our kayaks and off we went! They did warn us that with the light kids up front, it could be more difficult to control the boats and I experienced that first hand. We had some time to get used to kayaking and then we crossed a channel and when we got to the other side, Crystal and I managed to run into each other and I got turned the other way and there was no possible way I could get turned back toward the group. I fought with it for several minutes, but then the guide Becky called out that they were going to come to me and we’d go the way I was facing instead. She said I’d been doing the right things but with light little Christian up front it just wasn’t going to happen.
So we continued on (looking now at a map we must have been going around Henry Island) and the next bit of adventure was the HAIL! It started outright hailing and we had to go back a bit and hold on under a dock for shelter until it passed! The hail hitting the water looked pretty cool, but those little chunks of ice hurt! It wasn’t long before it passed and we were on our way again. We stopped on Posey Island for a break and to look for sealife. We saw crabs, barnacles, limpets, lots of tiny snails, some fish, and oysters! For some reason, I had no idea we had oysters here.
The kayaking was fabulous. We all really enjoyed it! Christian and Joy paddled the whole way, which was amazing according to Becky. She said any 6-7 year olds she’s ever seen on the tours have given up paddling after the first 2 minutes. Those two sure were troopers and I could sure feel it when Christian was not paddling. It was a bit difficult to try to match his strokes and he did get me soaked but it was great. I loved every minute of it. Christian and Joy had quite the competitive thing going on (I’m going to beat you! No, I’m going to beat you!) LOL. We also saw Harlequin ducks, Cormorants, and a mink! So very cool.
Anyway, we returned to the harbor, and I was really proud of us for bringing the kayak perfectly back into the slip. Then it was time to leave Roche Harbor and go back to Friday Harbor in search of dinner. In Friday Harbor, we found Fridays Crab House and wow was it wonderful! Joy and Christian shared a whole crab, Crystal had a crab, and I had salmon (ok, I shared everyone’s crab too!). It was a perfect dinner! We ate outside on the top deck (which we had to ourselves). It sprinkled on us again a little bit, but not too bad. The kids were still as goofy as ever. Christian has decided that crab is his favorite food
We got the van into the ferry line at 7 (which was laughable because even when the ferry arrived there were only 5 or so cars in line) and then we walked over to the ‘Doctors Office’ which was a little shop that served coffee, ice cream, treats, and some food. Crystal and I were still stuffed from dinner but bought some treats for the road (peanut butter bar, a brownie, that sort of thing) and the kids both had ice cream. We thought they were crazy – we were cold!
On the ferry home, we saw the most beautiful sunset! Crystal got some wonderful pictures. We saw the mountains in the distance and the snow was reflecting pink… beautiful. We weren’t sure which mountain it was… seems like it must have been Baker? And on the drive home we saw the biggest moon! I’m sad my pictures of it didn’t turn out (but there’s only so much you can do from a moving vehicle).
Anyway, it was an amazing day all around and we’re definitely planning on going again!
But it’s all better now 
