This trip was a year in the making. It's a long story but a year ago a very convincing time share person and an hour long conversation led to the booking of this trip. We did have to attend a two hour time share meeting, but we got a super amazing deal on our hotel and got some gift cards for it all. Nate and I were both unsure and nervous about the time share meeting and the confrontation we might face since we knew we were saying no to anything they offered but we were really excited for time with family and at the beach. We love going to the ocean and it's our family's happy place.
We left Thursday morning, and our first stop is this tiny ferry that takes you across the Columbia River.
Then we made a quick stop at a viewpoint to eat our lunch. The view was incredible!
Then we arrived in Seaside, and it was pretty rainy. I knew that this was our only rainy day, so I tried to do things that were inside. Christy and Myla met us in Seaside, and it was really fun to have them around and I'm grateful they were willing to drive over to spend some time with us.
Our first stop was to the Aquarium. It is a very small aquarium but really cool and they had some really good stuff to see.
We even got a small container of sardines to feed the seals. Paige was the only one brave enough to touch the fish. I almost got McCall to do it and then she chickened out in the last second. They were fun to watch!
Rain pelting our faces for a quick family picture.
Then we went to the carousel mall and of course had to go on a ride on the carousel. I thought it was funny that McCall wanted to ride the pig.
The first shop we wandered through was the hat shop, and the girls had so much fun.
Then we just did some window shopping and wandered through the different shops. We had to recreate this pictures. (The one on the right was taken in 2015 in Seaside- why is time such a thief?)
Then we stopped at the Taffy Shop, and of course bought some taffy that we enjoyed during our stay.
Then we checked into our hotel, and I realized I forgot swim diapers for McCall, so she stayed in the room with Nate. It was so nice to visit with Christy while the girls swam for about an hour. Then they left to head home and we got some dinner.
We had to make a quick stop at the beach since the rain stopped before we called it a night. I kept McCall and Baylor away from the water since I knew it would be too much of a temptation and they had fun in the sand while Nate and Paige walked down by the water.
On Friday morning, we had our breakfast at the hotel, and then had our time share meeting from 10:30-12:30. We were both really nervous going into it. I was worried about how the girls would handle it, but they did amazing. We had some movies from them to watch, and Paige was very helpful with McCall. The guy that we ended up with actually made the experience pretty good. He was funny and sarcastic and had fun with us. He was good with joking and gave us all the information. A part that took quite a bit of time was going on a tour of their resort which is gorgeous. Then we did tell him we weren't interested, and they had another guy come talk to us that neither Nate nor I liked. He was more intense and was accusing us of not being good parents because we don't have these big grand vacations with our children, so we are denying them memories. He told us that he just wanted to plant the seed for us to do more vacations with our kids. I just smiled and nodded politely while the entire time in my head, I'm thinking that we do so many things with our kids and we just don't vacation the way they want us to vacation. They wanted to give us more numbers and lock us into something, but Nate and I just refused anything they offered. We didn't give in and we made it through our two hours and got to enjoy the rest of our vacation. The overall experience of it wasn't too bad but I'm not sure I would want to do it again. The main guy we had made the experience good because if we would have had the second guy the entire time it would have been miserable.
We left the meeting and got some lunch and then went and spent the next four hours at Indian Beach in Ecola State Park. It slowly got warmer and warmer. It was a wonderful afternoon spent running away from waves, building a sandcastle, jumping over waves, running in the sand, exploring, and just enjoying this beautiful place.
Our little world!
Once the tide had got out a little bit, we went and explored the rocky area to find little sea creatures and lots of fun rocks to climb on.
We got back to our hotel and got some pizza to enjoy in our room before spending the evening in the pool.
Our hotel was really in a nice location. It was right on the river and then just about a 5 minute walk away from the beach. That evening we walked along the beach and got to enjoy some live music and Nate noticed that there were a lot of people that had corgis. We ended up looking up and Saturday was Seaside's Corgi Beach Takeover. We added some fun things to our agenda to experience for the next day.
Saturday morning our first stop was at the Welcome Center for a quick photo op.
Then we went to a painted rock. We came prepared with our own painted rocks to add to the collection.
Then we made sure to go to the beach to experience some of the corgi beach takeover. There were so many people there and SO many corgis.
The first thing we wanted to see was the costume contest. We saw the end of the contest where just the dog had a costume on and then we saw the group contest where the owner and the dogs all had a theme. it was super fun to watch, and the winner was all based off of applause by the crowd.
Then we hung around and got to a closer spot to watch the corgi races. It was so fun to watch! Paige and I could have stayed for the entire time, but McCall and Baylor were done, and we were all getting hungry for lunch.
As were walking back to our hotel, we got to see the start of the Miss Oregon Teen Parade which was pretty fun. We got to experience all sorts of new things which was memorable and fun.
After lunch, we headed back to the beach to spend the afternoon enjoying the ocean. We had a quick photo op with Lewis and Clark.
Then of course when you are in Seaside, you have to take advantage of the swings that are right on the beach.
It was windier this day, but we still had fun playing in the water and the sand and all got lots of sun.
McCall fell asleep on our walk back to the hotel. I stayed back with her while she slept, and Nate took Paige and Baylor to swim in the pool. The plan was for McCall to join them once she woke up, but she slept for 3 hours, and the girls were happy to swim for that long.
After we had dinner, we went and wandered through more shops and got some ice cream that we enjoyed with our view of the ocean.
Our beautiful view of the river that our hotel was on and we also got to enjoy watching the sun set for our final evening in Seaside.
We checked out of our hotel and made sure to make it to our next stop at low tide. This place has been on my bucket list, and it did not disappoint. It was Hug Point, and it was so cool and the views were AMAZING. I highly recommend going here and especially going at low tide. There were so many cool inlets and caves to explore. You are exploring alongside a cliff, and it is incredible.
There is this amazing spot where there is a small waterfall. You can climb up on top and it's a completely different world up there and the view of the ocean is incredible.
Then we spent more time and around every bend was just more amazing cliffs and caves.
There is this old wagon trail that was carved out of the mountain. The picture on the left is an old picture I found on Google of it and the other two pictures are us walking on it.
These two always know where to find the water and don't care how cold or windy it is!
When we were walking along the old wagon road, there are so many sea anemone and mussels, and then I spotted a star fish below. So, we hurried down and then we found a whole bunch of star fish and cool sea creatures to touch and look at. It was the perfect stop to finish our vacation on the beach!
We made a quick stop in Astoria to get some fish and chips at Bowpickers.
It was such a wonderful long weekend spent on the ocean!
