Family Trip to the Oregon Coast

June 6-9th was our family vacation to the Oregon Coast. I had purchased a Groupon for the Oregon Coast Aquarium and we wanted to camp at Honeyman State Park (a fabulous state park near Florence, Oregon), so we decided to combine them into one trip. We also decided to take advantage of homeschooling once again and go the week before school got out so it was less crowded.

Monday morning we drove to Newport and spent the day at the Aquarium. The kids loved seeing the sea life. We stayed in a hotel that night near the Aquarium, so the kids loved being able to eat out and swim in the hotel pool.

Here are pictures from the Aquarium. I love the picture of Kylene with the Giant Japanese Crabs...it's actually her reflection but it makes it look like she's right there with them!

Tuesday we headed down to Honeyman State Park, stopping at a couple of beaches along the way to play in the sand and have a picnic lunch. Our favorite beach ended up (once again) being the little beach at the freshwater lake in Honeyman State Park. There is basically no wind, the water is calm, and there was hardly anyone else there. They could have played there for hours (and I guess they did over the next few days). One morning we also rented a paddle boat to go out on the lake. The rest of the week we enjoyed hiking, going to the beach, riding bikes around the campground, playing at the playground, roasting marshmallows, and living all together in a yurt. I loved the yurt part of it because it meant I had a bed to sleep on--no "on the ground" camping for this pregnant lady, thankfully--and a little heat in the morning when it was cold. But we still had the camping experience with the fire, cooking our own food, etc.

We came home Thursday evening, tired and ready for our own beds and showers, but we enjoyed the time together. I loved that Kyle took Friday off work as well so we could clean up and recover and still enjoy the weekend all together. It was a great start to summer!

Here are pictures from beach and camping: