Wow what a day. On top of the world.
First, some cute looks in the hotel room. Watched a few Columbo and Murder, She Wrote reruns on the hotel TV during overnight and morning feedings. Ida was awake for a 2 hour stretch last night bookended by two 4-hour stretches of sleep. This is beginning to look more structured and doable for the future (which is good, because I return to work next week).
Next, a visit to Aunt Mary and Uncle Johnny's grave. Aunt Mary was like a grandma to me and raised my dad for several years. She was quite a character.
We also visited my Carmichael Grandparents' old home and Aunt Mary's old home. There wasn't much (new) to see at Carmichaels, but Aunt Mary's looked different. All the tall trees were gone from both places, which was weird. I honestly thought Aunt Mary's house was beyond repair, but there it is, all neutral-grey and modernized-looking:
Her cherry orchard hasn't been plowed under into endless subdivisions, but it's oddly empty. I wonder what the future holds there.
There was a family living in her daughter Jessie's old house/trailer on the property, with a little kid in diapers running around playing in the old barn that I used to play in / got frequently scolded for playing in because it was old and unsafe 40 years ago. Out of respect for families of shirtless kids I didn't post a picture.
The sunnyslope area of Wenatchee was all torn up, so it took us a long time to travel very short distances, but we eventually picked up some fast food and took it to Ohme Gardens for a picnic.
This was my first visit to Ohme Gardens. It was beautiful. A little slice of heaven in eastern washington. We walked Ida all around. There was a big brushfire on the hill south of Wenatchee.
From there, it was time to climb the mountain to our true destination for the weekend. We may have taken a wrong turn at some point, but we got to visit the very (erm, brief) town of Brief that was directly below our destination.
We had a downpour hit during our trip. These turkeys found a safe place to shelter:
After about an hour of windy paved roads, we hit the last 4 miles of bumpy dirt roads. This is why we brought the 4WD vehicle. I'd never gone off-roading to such a degree. It was kind of a white-knuckle affair, where I had to keep enough momentum to keep rolling forward over all the loose rocks while keeping the car from bouncing off the road. We listened to Sting to help keep calm over those white-knuckle roads. Baby slept through all of it, so it must have been a success.
So this is our home for the next two days, the Tyee Lookout. Years ago, I heard about staying in fire lookouts. and I've been trying since before we had kids to secure one. It's taken 14+ years, but I finally got one, and when was it available? When baby was 6 weeks old. So, we made the best of it. Having all 6 of us trapped in a 14x14 room was not a great idea, especially with several of our kids' fear of heights, etc. So, we made arrangements and made it a Jen+Alex+Ida trip.
Upon arrival, we were astounded by the views.
This is amazing. We did have to schlep our gear up the equivalent of a
few flights of stairs from the car, but that's the price you pay for
staying on top of a mountain. There's no electricity or water, and the
cell service is iffy, but this is amazing.
By the time we gout our gear loaded in, there were several small thunderstorms in the hills around us. Nothing ever got really close, and this place is really wired up with a lightning rod and several grounding cables, so I THINK we're safe. It was cool to see lightning, and things cleared up by sunset.
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