A racoon ass kicking and lots of crabs

Our day started off early (as usual) so we went to hang out on the deck. 

every kids dream, a canon ride!

playing at the park on the harbour in Nanaimo

just starting our trek to the ocean's edge

In the shallow tide pools the water was nice and warm.

having a blast in the water

The family enjoying supper at a local joint just after leaving the beach

We got quite the treat while eating pancakes.  2 baby deer and 3 adult deer were playing in the yard, they were only a few metres away from us, but on the other side of the fence (this fence offers little to no protection we learned as this evening we saw one jump the fence quite easily).  Then Mr. Raccoon came back and put on a little show for the kids climbing trees.

We decided to start the day and hit downtown Nanaimo today and check out the harbour.  Seeing all of the boats was very cool.  It is so different for the kids.  They wanted to explore everything.  We grabbed lattes and walked the docks and enjoyed the dragon boat races that were taking place in the harbour.  There was a massive playground that was neat and the kids played their hearts out all morning. 

By 11:00 am they were exhausted.

We planned it out so that we went to Parksville when the tide was out.  The tidal pools were unbelievable!

They freaked the kids out though. First they took off full tilt into the first one and were shocked to see tiny little crabs running around, clams and sand dollars (none of which they have ever seen up close before).  Then they all wanted to be carried, yeah right! 

It took awhile for them to realize there was nothing to be afraid of, then they were ready to explore.  They collected a whole bucket of neat shells and helped save some sand dollars by putting them back into the water. We walked close to 300 yards through the tide pools and sand until they were able to swim in the ocean. We ended up hanging out on an island of sand right at the oceans edge and created worm habitats as we dug in the sand. We realized it was time to walk back to land once water began to creep up and was going to flood our bag and blanket in a few minutes time.

The kids were amazed to see the tide come back in!

Not only was the beach amazing at Parksville, but they had an unbelievable playground and spray park. The kids didn't want to leave. We spent so much time playing there that the kids were starving and ready for supper. Even though we had planned on BBQing, we instead stopped at a very neat restaurant that we stumbled upon by accident. Avos was the name, and avocados was its' game.

We had fresh chips and salsa sitting out on the patio. Our oldest son ate his weight in prawns. The kid meals were awesome and came with fruit and veggies and dip and juice.  The kids had grilled cheese and chicken quesadillas.  Mom and Dad shared a Baha salad with avocados, beans and sprouts and fish tacos with mexican rice and refried beans.  They were amazing!!!

The other amazing thing today is that it is Mom and Dad's 11th anniversary! It was a great way to spend a day like today, we relaxed, we played, and we had a great time together.

And it was as if the racoons in the backyard this evening knew that today was a special day, because they put on a 3 minute show as 2 racoons proceeded to kick the ever loving s*** out of a third racoon who had wandered by.

Gotta love what vacations throw at you.

only 1 kid threw up

A standard Ogopogo picture is needed.

Ferry ride to the IslandOur oldest enjoying Little Qualicum Falls. 

Our first foray onto the beach

Kids having fun, extreme insanity building....

All living s*** opens up and our oldest fella regresses 50,000 years!

Now we didn`t forget  to post about our day yesterday, we just wish we could forget about it.

We headed out of Kelowna early and hit the road for Vancouver.  It was a long drive for the kids, which made it a long drive for us! 

We checked into our hotel in North Vancouver.  It was a bit of a dive (so we al together left it off the hotel ratings for this summer), but supposively close to all of the attractions and close to the Ferry.  We dropped off our stuff and took off for the 5 minute drive to the Aquarium. 

But after 40 minutes of waiting to drive  the 3 blocks onto the bridge that would take us close to the Aquarium we decided it was best to go back to the hotel. I guess everyone in Vancouver also wanted to take the bridge to Stanley Park. The 1 km drive back took another 35 minutes.  We learned our lesson, driving in Vancouver is not the same as driving at home. The kids loved the pool though and didn`t want to get out, even for supper.

So we learned another lesson, book the ferry earlier than a day in advance.  When we went to book the Ferry over to Nanaimo our only options left were 6:20 a.m. and 9:30 p.m. 

6:20 a.m. it was! 

We packed up the night before and set the alarm for 4:15 a.m.  The kids loved the Ferry though.  Mom and Dad wanted to stay out on the outer deck, but the kids were more comfy in the big chairs on the inside of the boat.  We had brought breakfast with us, which was smart.

And they served delicious hot coffee.....so hot and delicious.

We got off of the Ferry at 8 a.m. and saw that Tofino was only 200 + km away so we made the silly decision to head to Tofino.  It took 4 hours to drive!!! 

We are still glad we went though.

The road to Tofino can be summed up by the warning signs of: Caution:  Narrow Winding Road.  Twisting and turning through the most beautiful forest ever! The trees were huge and we even saw 2 black bears.  We made a couple of stops on the trip, one to Little Qualicum Falls which was a super great little hike (lots of stairs, but easy terrain) and the goats on the roof in Coombs.  What a cool gimmick the goats are. 

The store is super neat and has lots of stuff and really reasonable rates.  The kids found wooden pop guns...you can imagine how long they lasted in the van before we had to threaten to take them away.  The bakery was also super neat and they had lots of food and garden stuff.  Dad ended up buying salmon jerky, home made granola bars, and a spinach brioche, so damn yummy!!!

Very fun stop! Worth it for sure for a few groceries or a lunch stop.

After we finally reached Tofino, but not before someone couldn`t hold his pre-lunch down going around all the little twists and turns in the road, the drive seemed worth it. 

Even with the sweet stick of barf mostly aired out of the van we stopped at the Tacofino stand for lunch, someone told us it was their choice for best fish tacos.

Ding Ding!!!

We ordered 1 fish taco, 1 bean taco, 3 cheese gringas (quesadillas), 1 mango-coconut smoothie, 1 mint-lime freshie, and 1 lemon-ginger freshie. It was amazing! The fish taco was hands down the best thing we have had in the fresh locally made food category. The little Tacofino truck pumped out a lot of tacos but they were lined up down the parking lot. We waited 30 minutes for our order, and they were moving to get everything out!

After lunch our little prairie children went nuts in the ocean.  Our youngest spent the entire time running out to the waters edge and then running away as the waves came.  He did this for a long time until he tripped and a wave caught up to him.  He had sand everywhere.  After that he yelled `bad water`and threw sand at the waves.  The other 2 ran and screamed and giggled.  They loved everything about it, the waves, the sand, the shells.  The were filthy and loving it!

It was great to see them experience something new and so different to what they have even done. There is something magical about waves and surf.

The drive back was long...but we did it!  We made it back to Nanaimo and went to a friends place to stay.  The graciously let us stay in their new house before they even move in.  It is on the side of a mountain overlooking the harbour!  It is insanely cool.  Tonight from the hot tub on their deck we saw a baby deer and a racoon.

Today was long but amazing!!!!

Fairy tale village, amazing ice cream, vineyards and ....Scandia?

The little guy enjoying chocolate milk from D Dutchman Dairy.

Walking from the chickens he said "cock-a-cock-a-doo-doo!" for 15 minutes straight.

Our little one feeding the young ones some hay.

Running from fairy tale to fairy tale in the Enchanted Forest near Revelstoke.

They went in and quickly came out saying "It is full of kids!!"

The kids using everything not nailed down to make a beaver dam between the beds in Revelstoke. Great Hotel!

"Those pigs have to be somewhere..."

Captain Hook vs. Captain Shaggy Beard

Today started with another early morning and a decent continental breakfast at the Best Western Wayside Inn. The pools were closed until 9:00 so we decided to hit the road because we knew of a few places we wanted to stop and check out.

And glad we did because today was jammed packed!

First, we stopped at the Enchanted Forest just outside of Revelstoke. It was early and rainy so we were alone there, but that place must get busy because it was cool! It was a walk through the forest with all the fairy tales and nursery rhymes recreated in little scenes spread through the forest. You could walk into all the 3 little pigs houses, the old woman's shoe, and even see jack cutting down the bean stalk (a tree) with a huge giant at the top of the tree looking terrified. We ended up spending close to an hour and a half there.

Second, we stopped in Sicamous Dutchman Dairy farm. We saw a sign that said friendly friendly farm animals...so we pulled off the highway and into an awesome place! We walked around the farm and looked at all the dairy cows, baby dairy cows (who were very friendly!), the chickens, llamas, donkeys, etc.

The kids loved the animals! The baby cows were great, we fed them hay, let them lick our hands clean, and they loved getting their heads scratched. And the surprise fun was our youngest went bananas for the chickens and roosters!

And we all loved the fresh ice cream, chocolate milk and whipping cream. Yes whipping cream, Dad accidentally bought whipping cream thinking it was milk and proceeded to chug it before realizing what he did. His guts were in knots for the rest of the afternoon.

But the ice cream.....holy hell! Best...ice cream...ever....period...no really...that...good...seriously.

Third, we were getting kinda hungry for lunch so we say signs for The Log Barn, waffles and sausage - sounds good.

The food was a bust because we pulled in behind two tour buses so it was way to busy to get anything. But it was not a complete write off because we found the smartest animals ever. Goats! These goats are on a bridge over the entrance to The Log Barn. What they have is a pulley system where the tourists (us) pay $.25 to buy a handful or corn and place it in a cup on a rope, that is attached to the pulley. These smart goats hear all this and use their little hooves to spin the pulley and raise the cup of corn up a good 50 feet to where they are camped on the bridge.

Smartestest animals ever!

Fourth, vineyards. Mom and Dad have just begun to enjoy wine (thanks to having kickass friends to share it with!) so we decided to pop by a few on the way to pick up a few bottles. This exchange sums up Dads experience at the vineyards:

- this vineyard was conducting a wine tasting -

Vineyard employee: "how are you doing over there?"
Dad: (carrying two bottles) "not to bad, just gonna buy a couple of these bottles."
Snobby vineyard patron: "So I guess you don't come to many wine tastings then do you?"
Dad: "no I guess I don't, good call!"

But we ended up with a few bottles.

Fifth, Scandia. We should just stop talking now about this place because it really doesn't deserve anything besides a glorious controlled blaze.
It advertises itself as a fun place for kids to have some fun and supper. But it was a terrible place that is a combination of a dirty Ruckers and and terrifying Chuck E. Cheese. Most of the games were broken and half of the working ones had no tickets. The mini golf was sad and thank goodness we can't tell you about the food because we left to go eat somewhere else. Just don't go there.

Sixth, hotel. We are at the Best Western Kelowna Hotel and Suites. Pretty cool place, it is super green and prides itself on being energy efficient. it has loads of skylights instead of lights in the hallways, they push recycling to the max, even in the rooms, and there is a full array of solar panels on the roof. The bad part is the hotel is 3 buildings,so we had to walk outside to go to the pool (and will have to go to the third building for the free continental breakfast tomorrow) and it was cool and windy tonight.

Here is how it looks:

Best Western Kelowna Inn and Suites

Room 2/5 (nice room and pretty good little balcony, but no microwave and the fridge is even to small for a dorm room.)

Pool 3/5 (the indoor pool is decent, no waterslides though. And the pool area is all concrete so it echoes a lot wand is very loud. The outside hot tubs are nice but small.)

Location 4/5 (good location. Near lots of shopping and restaurants, but not close to downtown. Can't walk anywhere.)

Hotel 4/5 (overall decent place, but we would likely look someplace else next time unless we had Best Western gift cards.)

Canmore, Giant Cedar, a drive and then Revelstoke!

So our morning in Canmore began very early, our middle kid was awake at 5:00! We tried to convince him to go go back to bed because it was waaaay to early for a hotel. Around 5:30 Dad got up with him and they went outside to not wake up everyone else. When we returned a few minutes later the young one was up!

So the three walk to Tim Hortons for a muffin and a coffee.

We had many other highlights for the day.

We left Canmore and headed towards Revelstoke. It was a slightly rainy day so the drive was a wet, lush and green one. We stopped at a few small streams and gathered some rocks and threw some rocks.

And we came across Giant Cedar.....the coolest damn place ever!! It was just off highway #1 but it was the farthest thing from pavement and RVs. It was a fantastic rain forest walk along a boardwalk. It was a lot of stairs that took you up the mountain a few hundred yards to an amazing cedar forest. The kids were good and enjoyed the walk and the old fallen trees, but it would be easy to lose their intest if you don't keep them engaged in the walk.

Giant Cedar was Dads highlight so far!

We also did a a forest walk to a 'rock garden', which was about 20 minutes long. It was on a a rougher path than Giant Cedar but the kids liked being able to walk and climb through the forest more. The rock garden was actually a deposit of old massive boulders that were covered in moms and lichen. Super fun as well, a lot more interactive and active.

Then it was in the Revelstoke after braving the last day of the long weekend traffic. It was raining and grey so we did not get to walk and see much of Revelstoke. But we did enjoy the Best Western Wayside Inn!!!

It was very new and had some very cool features that sets it off from others. It had a 6:00 am continental breakfast (great for early risers).

It also had an outside heated pool, outside warmer pool and an outside hot tub. Which was amazing because it was Gary and raining outside. But the best part of the hotel were the facilities. The pool change rooms were stellar, the breakfast area was clean, spacious, and the room was very nice and modern.

One thing lacking in town may have been the restaurants, though we ended up finding Emos pizza.....yes Emos. And to our dismay it was not staffed with long banged, pale, pantera shirt wearing teens. The food and service was very good though.

Busy day with a tough drive but a great end to the day sitting in the hot tub in the rain.

The hotel rates like this:

Best Western Wayside Inn

Room 5/5 (it was a good size and had amazing beds!)

Pool 4/5 (the pools were great, very clean and maintained. Only tick against it was no waterslide, but it is nice to sometimes not have a waterslide.)

Location 3/5 (it was just inside town so it was easy to find, but it was not really close to anything that we could walk to.)

Hotel 5/5 (a great place, the plaque said it was the #6 Best Western in Canada, and we agree!)

Canada's Birthday

Mom getting her feet wet in a cold mountian stream

The kids enjoying the refreshing splash in the mountian strem.

Our oldest boy looking out of the gondola in Banff.

The kids waiting for a Parisian Waffle in Canmore

A little cotton candy at the Canada Day celebration in Canmore.

A little Boston Pizza art to share with the world.

The view from our hotel balcony.

The view on our hotel balcony as we read books before bed.

Today started with a bang. Everyone was awake by 5:30....I guess that is the down fall of being asleep by 7:00 the night before. Instead of waiting 3.5 hours till the pool opened the family decided to get going to check out the mountains and get a start to our day.

We were exploring kananaskis village by 7:00 am. And on our way back to Highway 1 we came across a waterfall at the side of the road. It was awesome to see the kids put their feet in the water and try to come up with ideas as to why the water was so damn cold.

We also stopped the at a Texas gate and let the kids loose at figuring its' purpose. It took them a few minutes and some wild ideas like " a place where animals can hide under and get away from the cars." or "this is so I can balance on these.", and our middle child began to tightrope walk across the gate.

Then it was on to Banff and the sulphur mountain gondola. When we pulled in it was getting a bit busy, but we had almost no wait at the bottom and the top to get on the gondola. Both of us, Mom and Dad, were a bit worried as we started off but all the kids did great! Our middle one was crazy excited and was yelling and twitchy eyes. We were not the most prepared for the fact that the weather was going to be colder up top, we forgot our youngest one's hoodie. And he just kept saying "burrrr, cold. Burrrr, cold."

Then it was off to Canmore for some Canada Day celebrations. We walked around town, ate ice cream, ate cotton candy, ate Parisian waffles...and even ate birthday cake. The town was alright too. Then believe or not we even ate lunch.

Then we checked into the Best Western in Canmore and proceeded to go straight to the pool.

Meh.

The pool was alright, would be even better if the kids were a few years older. The was no shallow end and the waterslide launched the kids out at Mach 2. But the best part of the hotel was the balcony. We read books on it, we ate snacks on it, and at 10:30 we even were able to watch the fireworks. It was a great end to the day.

Except we then watched some bad rom com on cable way to late and we are currently regretting we stayed up for it.

Overall the hotel rates:

Best Western in Canmore

Room 3/5 (clean and roomy, but a bit old and dated)

Pool 4/5 (it is still. A good pool, slide and hot tub. But not quite suited to younger kids)

Location 5/5 (on the main drag in town and nice and close to restaurants and grocery stores)

Hotel 3/5 (we would stay here again but would likely look somewhere else next time for a place with a cool pool)

Tomorrow we are off to Big Cedar and Revelstoke.

Less than a week until summer vacation!

Weeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Summer vacation here we come. Though it is not all roses and yummy sandwiches, Mom is a teacher so she gets the summer 'off' as well and Dad is resigned to wearing shorts at work as much as possible. 

And so to celebrate summer fun-cation we would like to share our collection of "Things you have to have when you...."

So we will release these amazing can't live without lists of things in the coming days so you can get ready for Carmageddo or when you hear "I'm bored!" at 9:46 in the morning. 

And so todays list is:

6 Things you must have when you are on a roadtrip.

1. Books

Lots and lots of books! Thropugh trial and error we have come to realize that we need to have the van about 1/3 full of books. It is one of those times that you feel like a terrrible person when you hear yourself say "That is enough books, put those back in the house!"

We have begun to gather our collection of van books in groups so we can switch them in and out and give hte kids some variety in their reading. Dumping 100 books all at once in the back of the van doesn't seem to work, weird.

2. Wipes, napkins, paper towel, garbage bags, tarps, etc.

The more options you have to deal with spills, messes, and things that come out of kids (boogers, spit, barf, poop, pee, and blood) the better.

We take our fair share of wipes for the small spills and sneezes, paper towls for those spills that happen right after the drink was just opened, dumped, and it takes you 10 minutes to pull over, and garbag bags to contain everything with an air tight seal. 

Napkins and klennex are a last resort if you have nothing left. They will do absolutly nothing besides give you the illusion that something is being done about the ice cream cone that fell on the floor.

3. Games

We are a big fan of games. There are alot of different things that can become a game with the right planning.

For the kids we will play hide nd seek, we will put something small in the van and they have to find it by the end of the trip to win a prize (ususally the prize is stopping for gas!!!), Mom does up awesome bigo cards for hte kids that are customized for each trip (this summer it will have animals and things for our drive through the mountains), and even silly games like eye spy are fantastic if hte parents join in and give the game some excitment. 

Last year we also bought the kids Nintendo DSs expecting them to wear them out with use. They do like them (they love hte voice recorded and hte simple drawing function that every DS has) but they don't idolize them like we did our old Game Boys.

For the parents we also do small silly things to help us pass the time and enjoy the long drives as much as the kids. Dad always buys $20 in scratch and win lottery tickets before we leave and Mom has to scratch tehm and reinvest all the winnings in more lottery tickets when we stop for gas. It is fun to see how long we can ride the wave of lottery winnings until we lose it all. Our record is $50 on one ticket nad Mom refusted to reinvest it all when we stopped, but I think we ended up winning enough to stop and rebuy 5 times. .....buckets of excitement, I know.

And this year we will be testing out our own Mommy and Daddy bingo card for our summer vacation. We will see how it goes but I fear we may get a blackout bingo sooner than anyone wants.

Parent Road Trip BINGO Card

4. Presents

We usually buy the kids some colouring books or small toys for when we go on vacations in the van. And we are big fans of hitting up a few garage sales and buying little toys and dolls, and cars and wrapping them individually for the kids to open one every day or so. 

Reason #1 Opening presents is the best thing ever!!!

Reason #2 Small toys help pass the time in a van

Reason #3 When someone throws up on a little garage sale toy you down even think twice about throwing it in hte garbage bag with everything else!

5. Coffee

No reason, We just love our coffee. We don't go bananas and cry if we don't get our coffee. we just like it...ALOT.

But you should make sure you take along your favorite drink (non alcholic) or snack for you to enjoy on the drive, especailly while the side kicks and ceasefires are flying in the back seat.

6. Bottles of water

We make sure the kids have their reusable water bottles that they fill up each morning we leave hte hotel, but still....keep a few bottles of water on hand. Not just regular bottled water, find ones with a wide opening.

They are great when you run out of water nad a red faced exhausted kid is crying dust becasue they drank all their water 3 hours ago and are soooooo thirsty it hurts!

a road trip multi tool must have!

But we also use the bottels to split any beverages that you buy through take out. THe drink sizes are stupid big and who wants a kid to drink that much iced tea or juice? So pour some into an empty bottle and problem solved, everyone gets some but just not too much.

Also the bottles come on handy....for....

Peeing in the van. I said it! You will find yourself in a situation where your little boy has to pee so bad they have a death grip on their weiners, oh and you are in hte city and can't pee on the side of the road. 

Our little guy has learned hte deft art of peeing in a bottle a number of times. But we stress that this is only in the event of an emergency. Or as he states it a "Pee-mergency!" or "Catastro-pee!"

***

7. Bonus entry on the list!

We have added one more thing onto the list, it  is something we don't have (we just use a small rubbermaid tub instead - see top picture) but would loooove to have. But this beauty is something to behold....

Kids Back Seat Organizer from Organize It 

I know I would have loved to have one of these when I was a kid. It would have been an awesome base for Ninja Turtles and GI Joes! 

Check out the link above to order one online, only about $40.

 ***

Well these are some of the things that we can't so with out on our long road trips. 

If you have any must have items on your vacations please let us know! And stay tuned for the next list, 

5 things you have to have when you go to the park.

Update on 2012-06-26 19:13 by Steve Torgerson

UPDATE:

We almost forgot one of the most important tools to have with you on your long road trips. We have taken ours on the past two trips and have it ready to go this time again, it is the wonderful Grabber-nabber!

Or the robot claw hand pincher thingy.

Great tool for picking up fallen toys...but also a very deadly weapon when tempers flare!We have the two older kids in the back row of seats in the van on trips and passing items back and forth between us and them is difficult. 

Well it was until we discovered the Grabber-nabber!!!

This mavel has saved us numerous times from having to pull the van over to pass snacks back or retrieve a fallen toy. If you have one take it along, if you don't have one, buy one!