We were able to spend the entire month of August in Washington State and spend time with family and friends. We picked an RV park in Anacortes. It wasn’t super close to family, which was the bummer for us. The reason we picked this park was so we could explore that area, and also for the cost savings. Our initial pick was an RV park right by my sister’s house, which would have been AWESOME. The problem was that the only spot they had for us was a tiny back-in that would just barely fit our rig. It was next to the playground and a LOT more $$ than the park in Anacortes. Since I need to work during the day, the fact that a playground was right there was a tad worrisome. After seeing the park during our 1st visit at my sister’s house, we knew the decision to bail out was a good one. It was really nice but it was packed with people.

Every weekend was spent either at my sister’s or parent’s house so we could soak up as much time with them as possible. My sister and husband recently purchased a new home on Lake Goodwin. It was so much fun to get to go and hang out with them at the lake and see their new house. We are so excited for them, it’s a beautiful home and the boys seem to really love their new neighborhood. We even hung out at the lake on a Sunday when there was so much smoke cover that we probably should have been inside, but it was still fun! During the week, after work, we pretty much ate at every restaurant in Anacortes, explored Deception Pass, and took the ferry to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island one day. Unfortunately almost all of our time in Washington was under a over of smoke. There were fires everywhere along the west coast and we just couldn’t escape them. We had hoped to do a lot more exploring, like taking hikes and such, but with the smokey conditions we decided to go ahead and hold off until our next visit.

The day we went to Friday Harbor was beautiful. Not smokey at all, it was all blue sky and a perfect day for a ferry ride. We hadn’t been there before but had heard it was a cute little town. It was! We really enjoyed the day and would go back for sure.

Both of us had been to Fort Casey before, but since it was so close, we had to go and check it out again. We are thankful we did, it was a nice day and not a lot of people there. We also saw a couple cruise ships passing through, so we had to call Korey’s parents to let them know…they had an Alaskan Cruise coming up, we were so excited for them!

Our RV park was nestled in the trees and we lucked out with a pretty great spot. No one behind us, and no one in front of us. There were neighbors on both sides, but both left often. So, we felt like it was a pretty private spot. We would stay there again for sure.

What we did not do was take a bunch of pictures for some reason?!!! I am very disappointed in that now that I am looking back at the pics to post in the blog. Maybe because we were at “home” so we didn’t take as many as we normally do? We will be better about that for our next visit for sure.

It was a busy month, and that last week was especially busy. We had the chance to go out to dinner with my cousin Tim, his wife Jen, and their adorable little guys (Titus and Justice). We had yummy Thai Food in old downtown Mt. Vernon. What a cute little area! I went with my cousin Jamie, her daughter (Grace) and my sister (Erin). We went to Mexican food, all of us could eat Mexican food daily. It was such a fun dinner and I am SO SAD that we didn’t take any pictures, we were too busy chatting. The next night we took my grandparents out to dinner. We met up in Smokey Point at Hop Jack’s, to get to spend some time with them, but also because they are very generously passing their Thousand Trails membership over to us. We have not yet completed the transfer due to waiting on the paperwork, but very much looking forward to having that option to choose from as we travel. They spent a lot of years park hopping in their travels and really enjoyed the parks. We cannot wait to stay at the one near Disneyworld. Then more Mexican Food with our longtime friends Chris & Jen, and Aaron & Cheryl. This night with them was such a blast, so many laughs and it had been years since all 6 of us were together like that. It was like no time had passed. These girls have been close friends of mine for years. I am so lucky to have these ladies in my life, for so many reasons! Then the Sunday before we left, we had such a great day spent with my parents, my aunt Valesa and cousin Shaun. They all came up to Anacortes to visit with us. We picked blackberries, gave a tour of our Fithy to Valesa & Shaun, hung out for a couple hours and then went out to lunch for some yummy clam chowder at Bob’s Chowder Bar & BBQ Salmon… it was a crazy long wait for the food, but worth it. We had lots of laughs and nice weather to be able to sit outside. Another fun night we had was spent with our close friends Russell, Sam and Matt. We lucked out and got to hang out with Russell & Sam 2x during our stay. We love them and they have been such great friends to us over the years. We shared yummy meals and as always with these friends, lots of belly laughs. Russell travels a lot for work, so we are really looking forward to getting to see them while we are on the road. Love the Hilderbranderson’s!

Our last night there was spent at my parent’s house. My sister Erin and her husband Tyson came over as well, we pigged out on Mexican food and visited for a few hours before Korey and I had to head back to our Fithy to pack up and get ready to head out the next morning. I love time with my family, and loved that we were able to see them so much over the month, even though we were kind of far away. We got to go to our nephew Quinton’s 1st football game of the season where he was starting quarterback and kicked butt in that game. We got to see our nephew Caleb cruising around in his car after getting his drivers license while we were there. Those boys are growing up so fast and we loved that we got to see them. It was bitter sweet to say “see ya later”, we always miss family and friends when we leave (we have moved SO MANY TIMES over the years, so this is not something new to us), but it was exciting because we were leaving to head east, into areas that we have never been.

The plan was to stay in Ritzville Washington that Saturday night, for a stop over (driving passed the Gorge and missing the Dave Matthews concerts over labor day weekend…UGH) and then head to Missoula Montana on our way to Yellowstone because of Korey’s 1st Workamper gig. We were very excited about this…. plans had to change once in Yellowstone, more to come on that.

We loved our time in Washington and very much look forward to heading back. Luckily we know we will because my family is there, and so many of our friends. We have been super slackers with updating our blog. We have only been keeping up on posting to Instagram, so this week we will try to catch up to present day 🙂 a lot has happened over the last 2 weeks in our travels, and looking forward to sharing our adventure.