WE SAW A WHALE

I know we did a lot of others things this past week, but the most exciting part for me was when we saw a humpback whale breaching. We were on a ferry. Yeah, a ferry. Take THAT expensive whale watching boats who chase the whales and I probably won't go on them anymore anyway. Wait, where was I?

Oh, yeah...a visit from Brent's mom, sisters - Julie and Jess - and our niece Tayler. And a running of the Rock and Roll Marathon in Seattle. Well, not me. I was a cheerer. But others ran it.

Last Monday, Brent's mom flew in for a week long visit. We were happy to see her and happy to see the beautiful weather that coincided with her visit. Well, at least part of her visit.

We played with Reyes and Camilla.
This is just Reyes here. Cami was asleep. But she was fun when she woke up!

We went on a walk in Manchester State Park on the first day of summer. Which was GLORIOUS here in Western Washington!
This isn't a great scrunch picture, sorry. I was trying to get The Mountain (aka Mt Rainier) in the background but I failed miserably.
A ferry AND The Mountain in one picture - how much more Northwest-y can you get?

And we ate good food and sat on the deck in the beautiful weather.

Then Julie, Jessica and Tayler got here and even more fun started!

Four of the contingent - Brent, me, Julie, Mom - drove up to Vancouver, Canada to get a little wicked. Or to see Wicked, I forget which. The drive was WROUGHT with traffic, but we had a good time at Wicked.
But, did I mention that we saw a whale while we were on the ferry. I didn't? WE SAW A WHALE! We were sitting there in the ferry watching the water because, really, what else do you do on a ferry? And Julie said she saw a splash. Then all of a sudden, Mom screams - quite literally, it was kind of funny - and I look out in time to see some sort of marine going animal splashing back down in the water. Then it breaches again and I see that it's a young humpback whale. It breached about 4 or 5 times in total. None of them when I had my camera out, but we did see it. So cool. Although, I'm a little bit worried about it. We were on the Kingston ferry which is still in Puget Sound - no where near the ocean where the humpback should be making it's way to Alaska. I hope it finds it's way out.

Since I couldn't get a picture of the whale, I took a picture of us instead.

The really sad part was that Tayler REALLY wanted to see a whale - or a shark - from the ferry. And we saw it without her. Sorry Tay!

Then the real craziness started.

We met Jess, Tayler, Ryan, Marcela and the girls at their hotel in Seattle to "exchange prisoners." They were getting Julie and we were getting Tayler. Why? So that Julie, Jess and Marcela could run the Rock and Roll Marathon in Seattle. Jess and Marcela ran the half marathon and Julie ran the full.


The next morning we had to get up at zero-dark-thirty to catch the 7:20 am ferry to Seattle. Yep, I said 7:20 am. It was an early morning.
This picture was taken when I dropped my camera at the ferry terminal at 7 am. I think the early morning had something to do with my clumsiness. It's not like I'm clumsy all the the time.

See, it still works. Phew!

When we got to Seattle, we found the perfect place to watch the runners go by. It was right when the marathoners and half marathoners split so we knew we would see everyone if we just stayed in this one spot.

First to pass us was Marcela. There was a tall person in between her and us, so we didn't see her soon enough to get a really good picture, but...

Then Julie ran by.

We were on the right side to get a good picture of Julie. And her bright yellow shirt helped quite a bit too.

Then Jess came by. Sorry about the bad picture, Jess. I'm blaming it on the fact that I had dropped it not long before.


After that, we headed to the finish line. Marcela finished in 1 hour and 59 minutes. Jess finished in 2 hours and 31 minutes (that while she was really sick, on antibiotics and hadn't trained in two weeks). Then Julie came in...
at 3 hours and 52 minutes - we're guessing. Unfortunately Julie had a run in with a know-it-all runner who broke her transmitter so we don't know for sure. But it was under 4 hours. And that was her goal.

And this is what she looked like a few minutes after finding us:

She wasn't dead though...

Just VERY tired and sore.

Here a few other pictures I took as we were waiting...


After some time, they all rallied for a picture with their medals.

We are SUPER proud of them. They all did great!

After that, we all relaxed for a couple of days, had dinner at Uncle Gary's and enjoyed each other's company, but then Monday came around and it was time for everyone to go home. After I dropped Mom and Julie off at the shuttle, I met Jess, Tay, Ryan, Marcela and the girls for lunch at Red Robin in Seattle and a quick trip to the Market.


It was sad to see them all go, but it was great to get a chance to spend some time together. There is a crazy rumor that I'm going to walk the half marathon next year. (This rumor was not started by me.) I have to say, that is a crazy rumor and I do like cheering much better. I guess we'll see. That's all I'm going to say.