Our Camping Adventure-Tip of Oregon Day

We wanted to get away for a few days before the hustle and bustle of school started up again. We had limited funds and decided $17 a night for camping would be acceptable, so I used my coupons and things we had on hand to make up a nice little menu and we set the date for the first week of September. Adrienne had a babysitting job all summer and she had taken a week off to go to Idaho and did not want to take another week off. At the last minute Jake was telling me about the Argus cross country pics he would be missing, and then there was also the time trials that would place him on Varsity or JV. He did not want to ruin our trip by asking to stay home, so I told him if it was important to him not to miss these events, he was welcome to stay home. So he did! He would have gone along happily and not complained, and that is why we felt it was so important to let him decide.

So we took the little kids and camping we went! We had so much gear that we had to take out the two middle seats to fit it all in without a trailer. We had a bike rack hitched up so we could take the kids bikes.
We went to Fort Stevens. It was a beautiful week for camping, not too hot, not too cold. We took a day to drive to the South Jetty, which the little kids excitedly called the very "Tip of Oregon". We climbed up onto the observation platform and had an incredible view! We watched some container ships come into the mouth of the Columbia River. The first photo below is probably my favorite of the day, the land you see in the background is actually Washington. The kids played on the river beach while Richard hiked up onto the rocks and went down the jetty a ways.
Here is Joseph attempting to climb a really tall tree with his sandals on. I don't think he could have made it if he had been wearing spikes, but it was cute of him to try!
Ahhhhh, enjoying our campfire! The kids LOVED roasting marshmallows, but we didn't actually get to do this until the second night because I left them sitting on the counter at home!!Joseph is a born camper. I admit, I am not a real enthusiastic fan of camping. There is so much dirt around, and spiders.....yuck! But seeing how much the kids enjoyed the whole experience helped me enjoy myself! By the way, I only saw three spiders the whole trip, but one was trying to get into the tent and it was moving FAST! Kinda freaked me out. And there were very few mosquitoes which was nice. We did not use repellent, and I only got three bites the whole time we were there!