"Let's go camping!" Graham and I declared as we thought about what we could do with an odd mid-fall break in the girls' school schedule. Sure, it's November. In Alaska. Who wouldn't want to go camping?
This was our cute, little cabin - the Hermitage Cabin at the Shrine of Saint Therese.
You can see the cabin just poking out through the tree line, with a view to the wide open frontier.
Happy campers
We saw beautiful shore birds and lots and lots of sea lions. And let me just say, sea lions are noisy things! We heard them from our cabin while we were making dinner. And then on into the night.
It was a one room cabin, with two twin beds (a luxury for our first "camping" trip, really) and wood stove. We cooked dinner and had s'mores by the wood stove.
No electricity, just the light of our lanterns. Which was still enough light by which to read :)
We were so ready for the cold. We wore our long underwear, packed fleeces, sleeping bags and many, many blankets. Turns out, we grossly underestimated the power of the wood burning stove. The cabin was more like a sauna. We ended up sleeping in nothing but our underwear; and not the long underwear kind!
The next morning we set out to explore. One of the things I love about many of the beaches and shoreline areas is that there is so much room. Just room for the girls to wander and discover. Here Addy is just a speck out on the rocky beach, collecting sea weed and cool rocks.
Like this frosty seaweed specimen.
Addy and Cora have always been close. Through this move, and now on these family adventures, their relationship really has grown even more. Cora has a little difficulty walking and balancing on all the slippery algae-covered and/or barnacle-covered rocks. But Addy doesn't let that hold back her sister and is just as willing to help her along as anyone. Or when we took a hike, marked only by the bright green crosses, and which turned out to be much more challenging than Graham or I anticipated, they helped each other along.
Alaska is so big. The size of it and its many treasures - the mountains, the glaciers, the sheer wilderness - but there is such beauty in the small things, too. This tiny dew laced spiderweb. And this rock covered in mussels. I love capturing it all.
And just for your viewing pleasure, I even included the picture of us doing our best sea lion impressions.
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