Padilla Bay interpretive center - museum and beach, 4th grade field trip

     Tuesday I got to tag along with my grand daughters' school field trip. They went to Padilla Bay interpretive center/museum and did an exporing assignment on the beach.

     I love to walk on the dike trail, but I haven't been to the center for a long time. There is a neat little loop trail that is behind the center. We used to walk it with our kids when they were young. We discovered that there are a lot of owl pellets under the large trees, our kids enjoyed picking them up and looking in the owl pellets for mouse skeletons. Our youngest successfully put one skeleton together, from the bits in the pellets.

     I had a great time on the field trip. The staff were really good with the kids and had planned an excellent time both at the museum and at the beach. One highlight of my time there was when one of the staff came up in front of the kids and began singing silly, educational songs using familiar tunes. He was great! I was pleased to see that the Padilla Bay website has a "kids page" where you can listen to these songs.

     Here was one on You Tube that I loved: 

Click to see - Has any body seen my crab?

Click here for the link to the "kids page" songs

Padilla Bay, always a good place for the soul.

13.1 mi.'s in the Whistle lake trail system - up, down, mud!

This week marks the first time I've run a 35 mile week since Feb.1984, when I ran two 50 miles weeks in preparation for the Emerald City marathon (my PR 3:48:28). Besides getting my mileage up, I'm most pleased with how I felt after the run. We ran completely on trails. Many ups and downs, but very beautiful. I only had a slightly sore left hip that night. I put on an XL icy/hot patch and felt great. I think I'll invest in a lifetime supply in those things!
We started at the Whistle lake parking lot, ran a series of connected trails that took us around (with lots of ups and downs and mud) Whistle lake, Mt. Erie, and Heart lake. There is an excellent map of the trails in this area available at the Anacortes Chamber of Commerce.

We walk jogged most of the really extreme ups, but overall I'm really pleased with the whole day and the way I felt afterwards. Yippee!

Going to Whistle lake always reminds me of the kind of person my husband is. He is a kind and caring man, but one day he added "Hero" to his list of attributes. A few years ago we were hiking there with our son and one of his friends, we stopped to picnic and watch the people swimming in the lake. A group swam from a little point on the lake to another part on the lake. One young man stayed back on the shore. He paced around acting as if he wanted to follow them but didn't really want to. Finally he went in, about 1/2 way to his friends he panicked and started screaming and went under. Without blinking an eye, my husband jumped in and swam out to rescue him. It was an aweful scene to witness. Lots of screaming from his friends, him battling my husband in his panic. Thankfully his friends swam along side and helped when my husband tired and they all got him safely to the shore. I will never forget how quickly my husband responded. I on the other hand took the time to think about if I could swim that far when I saw it happen and realized after the fact that just by taking the time to think about if I should go in, the boy probably would have drowned. Now whenever we go to that lake, I think to myself  "wow" I'm married to a real life "hero", and wonder how that young man is today.