{06dec2011: Kalaloch Lodge}

This year for Thanksgiving we stayed in town so we decided to use one of the Groupon/Living Social/one of those sites we bought for a cabin at the Kalaloch Lodge out on the Washington coast. We had grand plans to drive out there early and get a hike or two in before check-on (at 4pm) and then hike a bit more on the way back to Seattle. Our total hike count at the of the road trip = 0. That's right we got none in. hahaha.
Thanksgiving day was very rainy, when we drove out to one hiking spot Jason had printed out, the roads were closed. So we tried looking for another spot, and instead we got caught in snow!

We drove for a bit but got worried since we hadn't stumbled upon the hike we thought we were headed to so we turned around and decided to just keep driving to Kalaloch.
We had already been driving a couple hours at this point so we stopped at a park along the Hood Canal and let Darwin out to stretch her legs. We walked along the beach and ran into this:

A dead fish! I was the one who spotted it, Darwin didn't even notice it at first til I pointed it out to her.


After a few sniffs she did try to pick it up, by its mouth, but a quick "uh uh" and she walked away. We ran down the beach and ran around the park a bit before loading back up and heading west.
We did get Thanksgiving lunch on the way... Jack in the Box! Darwin got her own cheeseburger and some fries.
After a long drive we made it to the Lodge where we were able to check in early. Darwin settled onto a bed while we unloaded the car.

Then we went to check out the beach while the sun was still out.

Beaches in Washington (and Oregon) are nothing like beaches I'm used to in Hawaii, but I love how wide and flat the beaches are here. 

Wide beaches are great for spreading out and making Darwin run between us!

Though we realized it's best to do that without a bright red coat on your dog at areas where off leash dogs aren't allowed (we walked far down the beach away from people and the lodge).

Getting down to the beach was pretty easy, getting back over the logs to the stairs, not as easy. It was starting to drizzle again by this point, and Darwin was a bit nervous crossing over the slippery logs. It took some time to find the route with the widest logs and the most sand, but we did it.

We headed back to our cabin and had some relaxing down time.

(This is a really good book btw for those of you who like to read: The Man in the Rockefeller Suit)

We had a 2 burner stove in our cabin so this was our Thanksgiving meal:

While Darwin had this:

And that was our Thanksgiving!
Stay tuned for day 2!