Last week, my husband said, “Let’s go away this weekend.” (Actually, he said you wanna leave tonight and come back in a couple of days, but I couldn’t wrap my head around it, so it got pushed to the weekend, so that my head could get “around it.”) So, we did. We hit up the Peninsula. The Peninsula is a beautiful place. Seattle is a beautiful place. The Pacific Northwest is a beautiful place, but the Peninsula in particular is lush, green, breezy, pretty and kinda a slice of heaven.
Our first time over on the Peninsula we went with some new friends (at the time) and we had gotten off the ferry and we were hungry, so we stopped at a place called Fat Smitty’s in Port Townsend driving on HWY 101.
The first time we drove past this joint, we stopped an weren’t planning on being impressed, but the four of us walked out of there knowing we had just had an amazing burger.
So, fast forward nearly 14 years, and we have a motor home filled with 4 children and it’s nearing 7:00 pm and we’re hungry and we’re wondering where to go to eat, and Mike and I are saying, “Remember that place? What’s it called? Isn’t it around here somewhere?” So, we’re driving and we say, “THERE IT IS!!!!!” Mike pops a U-turn (well as u-turn-ish as you can get in a 37′ motor home pulling a trailer (which we borrowed) with a 6,000 lb Land Cruiser on it.) Come to find out they were going to be closing in 15 minutes, but they were kind enough to stay open for our family of 6 to eat.
By the time we walked out of there with 4 burgers, 2 milk shakes, 2 root beers, onion rings, french fries and 4 one dollar bills pinned to the wall, the kids were happily fed and ready to start on the rest of the trip to Sequim.
As we were leaving, and we were in the motor home for less then 3 minutes, Mike said, “I’m being pulled over.” He makes it over to the side of the road and the State Trooper (or Statie as I’ve called them) makes the long walk from his car to the passenger side window of the RV. As we’re waiting for him to come (it takes awhile), I said, “Did we put the new registration in here?” Mike says, “I think so. I just can’t remember where I put it.” The Trooper makes it to the window and said, “I’m pulling you over because you have a tail light out on your trailer. Can I have your license, registration and insurance card?” Mike pulls out his license and shows the trooper and says, “You’re gonna think this is weird, but our water heater is right there next to the door of the RV, it doesn’t have a cover on it and I think that the registration is stuck in between some of the pipes.” The Trooper walks over to the water heater panel and comes back with the registration in his hand, shaking his head. Mike said, “I just renewed the tabs, and went to put on the new sticker and I didn’t have the keys with me to put it in the cab, so I stuck it in there and forgot about it. I can’t believe it didn’t fly away.” By this time, everyone is laughing, we can’t find our insurance card for the RV, but it’s the same place for our other cars and home, so he believed that we had insurance. The Trooper hands back our registration, and Mike says, “It’s a little wet.” Ha Ha Ha Meanwhile, our children had gotten out of the seats and were walking around the motor home. Nice.
Off we went to Sequim to explore and see what the area was like. And make fun of the name Sequim. I personally think it’s the funniest name town in the entire state of Washington.
The kids rode their bikes and had major wipe outs. We explored the street fair in Sequim and ran into old friends from Seattle. I had a lavender latte, which makes my year. We walked along the beach and looked for crabs. We saw caves by the Straight of Juan de Fuca. We saw Canada in the distance. We confirmed the rumor of the sunbelt in Sequim. Saw the rain forest and bright yellow birds. Saw the Olympic mountains on one side and water on the other. Imagined drinking coffee on a deck where I could soak in God’s creation. Josiah said, as we were driving from the beach, “I think this is what heaven looks like.” I think so too. It’s so beautiful there.
As we were coming back home yesterday we asked the kids what their favorite part of the trip was and they said, the burger. I think that food is always the first thing we think of when it’s that good and there’s dollars covered on the walls and there’s a big gigantic hamburger in front of the joint.
It was a lovely weekend away. Maybe we’ll move there….