Our time in Chimacum is getting shorter and we have less than a week before we start our long trip thru Canada, New England, down the east coast and over to Texas. We decided not to do any landscaping on our lot here at this time as we will probably be gone for at least a year. We did get involved with the park though from working on the Landscaping Committee on Thursdays to learning to play new games and attending some very delicious meals such as the one given for Memorial Day complete with flag decorations on all the tables.
One of the things we like about this spot is that we are living with folks who are either doing what we are doing or have already done what we are doing. Though many of them are in their 70’s and 80’s, they maintain an active lifestyle. The clubhouse is open at all times and consists of a crafts room, workout room, library, laundry, and game room in addition to the central meeting hall and kitchen most chefs would die for. Everyday there are games such as Ponytail Canasta, Mexican Train, Bridge, Poker, Cribbage, etc. that you can participate in. There are also classes such as a beading, Mah Jong, and computer. If none of those meet your fancy, you can work puzzles, read in the library or just sit in an easy chair by the fireplace. George and I decided to learn Mah Jong which is a game that originated in the Far East and is played with a set of 144 basic tiles. 
We had learned it when we were here six years ago but since we hadn’t played it for a while, we had forgotten how to do it. We had weekly classes of two hours and then weekly playing games of four hours. Many of the folks here are experts at the game so you learn a lot when playing with them.
Anyway, as you can see, we’ve been very busy with things here at the park. In addition, to the structured things, we are always meeting wonderful people and making good friends, such as our neighbors, Jaci and Don
who patiently taught us cribbage. One of our friends from our previous visit here was Irene Greening. She had, at one time, owned a Westie named Nugget and she adopted McKenzie from the start. She would come by and take McKenzie for drives, for romps at the Fort with the baby goats and to her trailer, especially if we were going somewhere that we could not take McKenzie with us. 
She was a lifesaver for us and McKenzie and it got to the point that each time we walked down the road, McKenzie would start pulling to go towards Irene’s home. I know McKenzie, as well as us, are really going to miss her when we take off for our trip.
Martha and Red, George’s sister and brother-in-law flew out to visit with us in early May. Unfortunately, the weather was not great while they were here. It was in the low 50’s, drizzly and foggy, but we still had a good time..JPG)
They stayed at a hotel in Port Townsend on the waterfront and we drove around looking at the various scenic places within 100 miles of Chimacum. We ate dinner at the John Wayne Marina and breakfast at the Blue Moose, which has very “colorful” patrons. On our trip to show them Sequim, we drove by an area that has many gnomes 
carved into the trees, fences, and buildings. After Sequim, we drove over to Lake Crescent Lodge. Unfortunately, we were a week too early to be able to go inside the Lodge,
but we did get to look at it and the beautiful view of the lake (too bad it was so foggy) but at least they were able to see the deep blue water of the lake. 
The day they left was very cool and sunny and as they were driving back to Seatac to catch the plane, they were able to see some of the beautiful landscape and the gorgeous flowering shrubs.
A day excursion took George, Brenda, John and me over to Pouslbo which is often called “Little Norway” and is nestled along the quiet shores of Liberty Bay. Here you can experience breathtaking vistas of the Olympic Mountains, Scandinavian hospitality and old world charm. We discovered unique specialty shops and the world-famous bakery, Sluy’s, which is the home of the famous Poulsbo bread and even more delicious pastries. Naturally, we had to sample some of them.
The first course was so good, we had to stop by before we left to take home some scones. After a day of shopping, we drove over to Silverdale to eat some halibut and chips at the Silver City Brewery. George tried the Ridgetop Red Amber Ale and I had the Fat Scotch Ale, brewed on site. They also brew their own Root Beer which is absolutely fabulous for those days when you want to be able to walk out of the brewery instead of stumbling out!
On another day, we all decided to take a trip to the Olympic National Park to hike up to Sol duc Falls. It was in the low 50’s when we arrived and got steadily cooler as we walked thru the forest and up to the falls. There was still snow on the ground in places and George and Brenda had a great time having a snowball fight
while John and I took pictures. The falls were running fast
and there was so much moss on the trees 
that they looked as if they were covered in green velvet. After spending several hours there,
we decided to drive back to Lake Crescent Lodge and eat a late lunch. Since we had missed eating there with Martha and Red, we thought we’d try it this time. Unfortunately, it was not to be! We got there at 2:30 and they quit serving at 2:00. So we just looked around and ended up back at Sequim for lunch. We have so enjoyed our time with Brenda and John, playing games and just wandering around. We weren’t able to see them this past winter as they didn’t get a chance to come to the desert for the winter. We’re hoping that we can all meet in Texas sometime next winter and they can teach us to do rockhounding.
Though our time has been short, we have truly enjoyed every minute that we have spent here. We will miss all our friends as we head out to do our next trip. The diesel prices are killers up here right now (currently $5.04/gallon), but we still want to take our planned trip. We’re not getting any younger and we want to go while we can still enjoy it and won’t feel intimidated about pulling a large rig. If the prices continue to rise, we may have to take much shorter trips in the future and sit for longer in one spot. We will re-evaluate after this year. Our plans are to spend approximately 3 months going across Canada to the Maritime Provinces. Hopefully we’ll be in the New England states in time for the changing of the colors. While we are in Canada we will not have the Broadband card for the computer as we are putting it on “vacation”, while we are there, but we will continue to try to find Wifi spots in order to keep you updated on what we are doing and where we are going. Hope you will continue to travel along with us and enjoy all the sites and experiences that we can share with you
. Love and hugs to everyone!!
One of the things we like about this spot is that we are living with folks who are either doing what we are doing or have already done what we are doing. Though many of them are in their 70’s and 80’s, they maintain an active lifestyle. The clubhouse is open at all times and consists of a crafts room, workout room, library, laundry, and game room in addition to the central meeting hall and kitchen most chefs would die for. Everyday there are games such as Ponytail Canasta, Mexican Train, Bridge, Poker, Cribbage, etc. that you can participate in. There are also classes such as a beading, Mah Jong, and computer. If none of those meet your fancy, you can work puzzles, read in the library or just sit in an easy chair by the fireplace. George and I decided to learn Mah Jong which is a game that originated in the Far East and is played with a set of 144 basic tiles. We had learned it when we were here six years ago but since we hadn’t played it for a while, we had forgotten how to do it. We had weekly classes of two hours and then weekly playing games of four hours. Many of the folks here are experts at the game so you learn a lot when playing with them.Anyway, as you can see, we’ve been very busy with things here at the park. In addition, to the structured things, we are always meeting wonderful people and making good friends, such as our neighbors, Jaci and Don
who patiently taught us cribbage. One of our friends from our previous visit here was Irene Greening. She had, at one time, owned a Westie named Nugget and she adopted McKenzie from the start. She would come by and take McKenzie for drives, for romps at the Fort with the baby goats and to her trailer, especially if we were going somewhere that we could not take McKenzie with us. She was a lifesaver for us and McKenzie and it got to the point that each time we walked down the road, McKenzie would start pulling to go towards Irene’s home. I know McKenzie, as well as us, are really going to miss her when we take off for our trip.Martha and Red, George’s sister and brother-in-law flew out to visit with us in early May. Unfortunately, the weather was not great while they were here. It was in the low 50’s, drizzly and foggy, but we still had a good time.
They stayed at a hotel in Port Townsend on the waterfront and we drove around looking at the various scenic places within 100 miles of Chimacum. We ate dinner at the John Wayne Marina and breakfast at the Blue Moose, which has very “colorful” patrons. On our trip to show them Sequim, we drove by an area that has many gnomes carved into the trees, fences, and buildings. After Sequim, we drove over to Lake Crescent Lodge. Unfortunately, we were a week too early to be able to go inside the Lodge, but we did get to look at it and the beautiful view of the lake (too bad it was so foggy) but at least they were able to see the deep blue water of the lake. The day they left was very cool and sunny and as they were driving back to Seatac to catch the plane, they were able to see some of the beautiful landscape and the gorgeous flowering shrubs.A day excursion took George, Brenda, John and me over to Pouslbo which is often called “Little Norway” and is nestled along the quiet shores of Liberty Bay. Here you can experience breathtaking vistas of the Olympic Mountains, Scandinavian hospitality and old world charm. We discovered unique specialty shops and the world-famous bakery, Sluy’s, which is the home of the famous Poulsbo bread and even more delicious pastries. Naturally, we had to sample some of them.
The first course was so good, we had to stop by before we left to take home some scones. After a day of shopping, we drove over to Silverdale to eat some halibut and chips at the Silver City Brewery. George tried the Ridgetop Red Amber Ale and I had the Fat Scotch Ale, brewed on site. They also brew their own Root Beer which is absolutely fabulous for those days when you want to be able to walk out of the brewery instead of stumbling out!On another day, we all decided to take a trip to the Olympic National Park to hike up to Sol duc Falls. It was in the low 50’s when we arrived and got steadily cooler as we walked thru the forest and up to the falls. There was still snow on the ground in places and George and Brenda had a great time having a snowball fight
while John and I took pictures. The falls were running fast and there was so much moss on the trees that they looked as if they were covered in green velvet. After spending several hours there, we decided to drive back to Lake Crescent Lodge and eat a late lunch. Since we had missed eating there with Martha and Red, we thought we’d try it this time. Unfortunately, it was not to be! We got there at 2:30 and they quit serving at 2:00. So we just looked around and ended up back at Sequim for lunch. We have so enjoyed our time with Brenda and John, playing games and just wandering around. We weren’t able to see them this past winter as they didn’t get a chance to come to the desert for the winter. We’re hoping that we can all meet in Texas sometime next winter and they can teach us to do rockhounding.Though our time has been short, we have truly enjoyed every minute that we have spent here. We will miss all our friends as we head out to do our next trip. The diesel prices are killers up here right now (currently $5.04/gallon), but we still want to take our planned trip. We’re not getting any younger and we want to go while we can still enjoy it and won’t feel intimidated about pulling a large rig. If the prices continue to rise, we may have to take much shorter trips in the future and sit for longer in one spot. We will re-evaluate after this year. Our plans are to spend approximately 3 months going across Canada to the Maritime Provinces. Hopefully we’ll be in the New England states in time for the changing of the colors. While we are in Canada we will not have the Broadband card for the computer as we are putting it on “vacation”, while we are there, but we will continue to try to find Wifi spots in order to keep you updated on what we are doing and where we are going. Hope you will continue to travel along with us and enjoy all the sites and experiences that we can share with you
. Love and hugs to everyone!!
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