Dear Mai,
We've been to Orcas Island 3 times now. This is an odd occurrence for us because Mommy and Daddy don't usually like to visit the same place more than once... 2 times at the most. But our 2nd Orcas Island trip was a bit chaotic. Let me esplain.
Early July, 2015
Grandma comes out for a visit. This is the first time she gets to visit our new dog Tito!
We have a great visit with Grandma and do all kind of things like your very first face painting
A trip to Leavenworth, bike riding, water taxi rides, a trip to the market, new swimming pool and just hanging out having a good time!
July 12, 7:30 AM
We head out for Orcas Island. Now Orcas Island isn't that far but it's not a super quick trip either. It's about 1.5 hours without any traffic, then waiting at least 30 minutes for the Ferry followed by a 45 minute Ferry ride. We have a nice cabin rental reserved and we're planning on taking Grandma on a sailing trip the next day!
We arrive at Orcas Island around 11:20 and head to the village to grab a bit to eat and poke around a bit until our check-in time is ready. Orcas Island is beautiful and filled with all kinds of neat little shops and restaurants.
Check-in time is 4:00 PM and we get to our cabin right at 4. It's a great spot with a nice view of a little cove on the Island.
We were there for a total of 11 minutes. Grandma and I were in the car about to head out to get some food for the night when my phone rings. It is Tito's dog sitter. He escaped. Ugh.
For the next three hours I try to help organize a search committee via texting and social media. It is evident it's not going to work and Tito's not going to be found.
We take off to catch the 8:20 PM Ferry and leave Orcas early.
We get home around 11:30 PM. It has been a long day but no luck finding Tito.
The next morning Mommy and I are about to start putting up flyers all over the place looking for Tito.
We get a phone call while we're in the photo copy store about to shell out some cash for some high quality flyers. One of Mommy's friends found Tito on craigslist under lost and found.
Mommy and I rush to pick him up. He had quite an adventure but he was finally saved by this awesome man named Dan who spent all night with him outside looking after Tito.
It was quite a few days but we were all glad Tito was back home and safe. But this did not stop us from our Orcas Island adventure
August 23 - 8:00 AM
We head out for Orcas again to catch the same 10:20 ferry. This time Shawn, Becky and Lorelei are coming with us! The owners of the cabin and the owner of the sailboat did not charge us and said we could come back and redeem so we did! This time, Tito came with us!
So we got to enjoy the cabin this time
Do some tide pooling. The tides here are crazy. This is how the same cove looks in the morning. By afternoon it is over 6 ft deep like the picture when we went with Grandma!
And we finally got to go sailing! It was an awesome 3 hour trip. You were so brave and excited on it. Mama and I were so proud of you. You didn't get bored once and were all about walking on the boat. You loved going to the bow of the boat with Mommy. Daddy was a happy camper steering the ship. It was awesome and intimidating feeling the power of the wind!
It was a great trip Mai! And we'll probably be back to Orcas. We love it out there, ever since our first trip when you were only 18 months old.
I still have a lot more catching up to do because we've been all over the place this summer... and we have a lot more planed coming up! Thank heavens you're such a good little traveler!
Love,
Daddy