Breaking News

We have returned from our family “Adventure”, all five of us and with no emergency room visits or lost digits either. On Monday we rode the train from Tacoma, WA to Klamath Falls, OR. An 11 hour trip that was somewhat educational. I discovered that train conductors/guys in train hats cannot be counted on to be patient with little boys who absolutely must spend at least 23% of their day wrestling to ensure sound mental health.

On Tuesday we discovered that yes one can stuff all the camping gear necessary for 5 people to enjoy the Jedediah Smith Redwood national park into an itsey bitsey rental car, but at least half of it will end up being stacked in the lap of the front passenger seat…can you guess who sat there? And we also learned not to read and obey camping signs during the off season, if only this info had been gained sooner it would have cut at least 44min. off of our search time for a camp site. But finally we got all set up in site #104 and the three boys with flashlights waving wildly settled into their sleeping bags to wriggle.

The next day we took off for a hike through the redwood forest and after running the batteries in my camera to the ground decided unanimously that those trees are BIG! And old. The oldest tree in the last primeval forest in Europe is 800+years. But conifers can live for thousands of years. Some of the redwoods are two thousand years old! The oldest tree in the world is a bristle cone pine that has survived 4,700 years on this earth and the largest trees are the giant sequoia. But the redwoods are the tallest. The largest one on record being over 360 feet tall.

On Thursday we hiked some more, saw some bear scat but no bear, played at the beach, walked on the jetty, and played in the most marvelous play ground I have ever seen. It was an entire little wooden village with slides and hidey holes and swings all hidden inside.

Then Friday we packed up early and zoomed ourselves up the most insane shoulder-less roads set into cliff faces that zip and zag past giant trees just inches from the road and ended up at the Oregon Caves where the big boys and The Hunky Hubby took a cave tour and Sweet Boy#3 and I enjoyed a fish pond and displays of grizzly and jaguar skulls.

And finally on Saturday we took the train home. The boys were so very good on that trip, but unfortunately we sat beside a man who had been on the train for 40 hours and was want to grumble about persons who were reading history books to their small wiggly children and infringing upon others “air space”. This is something new to me. But quite a few people talked of “air space” upon the train. Apparently if others can hear you this is “air space” pollution. But all in all a marvelous Adventure, the boys were in ecstasy and we had a good time too. But I’m still curious, have any of you come across “air space” regulations in your wanderings? We are such a strange culture. Terribly weird.