4 Wheels 4 Girls

June 4th, Lori, Sarah, and my sisters and I decided to go to the pool. It’s a pool where Lori works. And it’s indoors! She and Sarah had said it was really cool and that we’d have a lot of fun. Yeah, they were right.

When we first got there, I was kind of nervous. There were so many people! Lots of them boys. Uggh. I mean, it’s not that I don’t like boys, because I do, but there were just so many! Well, I had fun anyway. First, we had to go through the changing rooms and bathrooms to get to the pool. I don’t really know why they make it like that, ( I mean, with the people having to go through the women or men’s section to get to the pool ) but I have a guess: the people that work at the pool want you to realize that you have to rinse off in the shower before you go into the pool. What would you guess? I’d love to hear what you think.

So anyway, we rinsed off in the showers. Then we grabbed our bags and headed into the main room. The one with the pool! The huge one with the three different pools! The one with the water- slide and the– actually, I didn’t notice that when we first walked in. So I’ll get on with it. OK, so I was pretty excited. We walked over to the ladder and Ellie stuck her foot in. First she said, “It’s freezing!” I said, “Is it really?” And then she said, “Nah, it’s OK.” I stepped closer and dipped my foot in. It wasn’t very cold at all! Almost warm! But not quite. I made the mistake of jumping in and got the both good and bad consequences. Good: If I hadn’t jumped in then, I probably never would’ve. And the bad? Well, that was that it was extremely cold. So, good and bad beginning.

Luciana, very happy in the pool

But it got better. Me, my sisters, and Sarah did warming-up exercises before we practiced shooting baskets. Can you believe there was even a basketball hoop and about ten balls too? Yep, there sure was. Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw something moving. Swinging. I looked that direction. There was a long line of kids waiting in line for… a swinging rope! It looked really fun so I told Ana, Ellie, and Greta. Ana was too scared. But Ellie, Greta, and I were off! Pretty soon we were in line. For the first time, I looked closely at how they did it. There was a lifeguard standing next to one of those things that you dive off of to get a farther start in racing. A kid would stand on it and the lifeguard would use this long pole thingy to grab the rope. Then she would hand it to the kid and the kid would jump on and get swung across the deep end. Then they would let go and go flying over the pool and land in the water. It looked fantastic.

There I am, sailing above the pool

Finally it was my turn. I held my breath and swung as hard as I could. Then, when I was out the farthest, I let go and went soaring into the air. I tried to look around but everything was a blur. Suddenly– SPLASH!! And I went under. I came up smiling and did it over and over again. Until the lifeguard said it was everyones’ last turn and then she put the rope away. Boo.

Greta, taking off into the air

But the fun wasn’t over. Before I knew it, there was a different lifeguard opening up the slide. Ellie, Greta, and I walked as quickly as we could, without running, over to the slide. We did it a few times but stopped before everyone else did. It was a little too fast and spinny for me. Plus, it was so fast that you didn’t have time to try to take a breath before– CUPLUNK!! You hit the water.

Ellie is about to let go of the rope

We just swam for a while before the pool closed. Then we headed to the showers and we all showered with our swimming-suits on. The shampoo smelled really good, like watermelon.

We had a fun time at Lori’s pool. Thanks, Lori and Sarah! I miss you!

Friday, June 3rd, we left in two cars to Catherine Creek. The one I was in…actually, I’ll say the other one first. The “other one” was a camper van. I thought it was really cool, but the car I was in was cooler. Ellie, Ana, Jean, and Lori went in the van. Dad, Sarah, Greta, and I went in the… other one. Okay, I’ll tell you now. It was an old 1960s red mustang convertible. It was so cool! But it was also so windy. I had my hair in a braid that day, but by the end it was gone. Well, it wasn’t completely gone, but about 3/4 of it was.

Everyone piled in the Mustang

We drove across the Columbia river into Washington, to a state park called Catherine Creek. It was right on the Columbia river. Ana grabbed the scooter and we started. The little sister poodles ran off ahead. But we didn’t worry because they’d always come panting back. Sometimes I ran after them a little ways, then waited for the crowd to catch up. At one point, Roxanne ran up to some strangers, who were sitting on a bench enjoying the view of the gorge, and she hopped right up onto the man’s lap! He dealt with it pretty well.

We all took turns on the scooter, and we put Lori and Sarah’s little video-camera thing on a strap around our heads. We started the video and then scootered away. It showed everything coming up ahead of us. There was one time when Greta had just put the camera on her head and was scootering away when– CRASH!!!– she wiped out in the grass. It was really funny.

Jean is riding the scooter past lots of California Poppies on the Catherine Creek trail

We had a fun time on the Catherine Creek hike. I hope we come again–with the video-camera and scooter!

June 2nd, we visited the Bonneville Powerhouse. It is a dam operated by the Army Core of Engineers. Dad says the dam converts the power of the Columbia River to electricity. He also says that the Columbia River is one of the most powerful rivers in America because so much water moves down from the mountains so fast. I learned that the turbines (which are huge metal things that look kind of like dreidels, or at least some type of thing that spins) get spun around by the water, and they spin generators. Electricity is made and it powers the whole northwest.

That huge thing behind me is a turbine

The fish ladders helped the salmon swim upstream to where they can have babies and live the rest of their lives before they die. The picture there was of us looking underneath the ladder. It’s easier for the fish to swim under rather than over, so most of them we saw from the glass windows that looked into the fish ladder.

Watching salmon make their way up the fish ladder, through the dam

It was fun to learn about the Bonneville Powerhouse, the Bonneville Dam, and the fish ladders.

The Columbia River is running so hard right now that water is gushing over the spillway behind me

May 27th, we went to Humboldt Redwoods State Park in Northern California. I was just sitting at the table, looking out the window as we drove along the Avenue of the Giants, and suddenly we stopped in a pull-off. I guessed we were just pulling over to let the cars behind us go by, but I heard the RV shut off. Then Dad said, ” Whoever wants their picture taken, come out now.” So I did. There were lots of thin, windy, zig-zaggy, criss-crossy paths heading into the forest of redwoods. Just in case you don’t know, redwoods are the tallest trees on the planet.

We wandered through the woods, and took a few pictures. Here are some:

Here's a big redwood tree with the center burned out, but it just keeps on living.

Here's our family inside a fallen redwood.

Here's a picture of a redwood that goes way up into the sky.

We had a fun time wandering through the land of the earth’s tallest trees.

May 23 we went to Point Reyes National Seashore. I really liked the elephant seals.

On the way to Point Reyes we saw some harbor seals sunbathing on a sandbar. There were four or five of them laying together.

We drove out onto Point Reyes as far as we were allowed in our RV. Then we walked the rest of the way down a narrow road to a lookout over a beach, to see some elephant seals. There were about 100 pups on the beach. The pups were huge, about the size of me. The parents on the beach were about 500 pounds, but they were only 3 or 4 years old. A ranger told us that a full grown elephant seal gets up to 4000 pounds, almost as heavy as our RV, but we didn’t see any that big.

The elephant seals look like gray cucumbers lying on the beach

The difference between a sea lion and a seal is a sea lion can walk using its fins, but a seal sort of waddles along kind of like an inch worm or maybe a person with their legs and arms tied up. That was how the elephant seals moved on the beach. Whenever they moved, their blubber would shake and jiggle. They looked weird and it looked difficult for them to move.

We could hear the bulls barking. They would get all up in each others faces and bump like sumo wrestlers. Their barks sounded like someone with a low voice with a really bad, hoarse cough or something.

I wished we could see the elephant seals closer up, but the view we got was great.

After Marin Headlands, we drove along the most twisty and turny road ever to get to Muir Woods. I was reading my ” What Your Fifth Grader Needs To Know” book, and I had read the whole Language and Literature section and the Geography and History section and I was just getting to the Visual Arts section ( which I was really looking forward to ) when we pulled over in a big pull-off at the side of the road. I was disappointed when I had to stop reading, but when I heard we were having dinner, I tossed my book into my schoolwork bucket, and then sat back down on the seat. We were going to have Indian food for dinner! I love Indian food! And naan, too! Naan is a really good kind of bread. It’s delicious! Whenever Jean says we’re having naan with the Indian food, everyone says, ” Yes!” So, yeah, naan is marvelous.

When we had naan that night, I pretended it was a tree. A giant sequoia tree. I told the story of my tree. ” This is my tree. Its name is General Naan. At the very beginning of its life,” I pointed to the center. ” It was very healthy. For about five hundred years, it stayed healthy. Then one day, there was a small drought. He survived well, and continued his life. Then, about eight hundred years later, there were lots of bugs. The bugs destroyed part of the bark.” I pointed to where it was slightly brown. ” Then, as it got old, very, very old, like, three thousand years old, there was a forest fire. General Naan got burned, but still didn’t die.” I put my finger on a couple burnt spots around the edges. ” Then he lived for a thousand more years, and he was four thousand years old, and he was the oldest tree that ever lived. Eventually, he got so big that he toppled. It is sad, but he lived a very long, wonderful life.”

We went to bed after dinner, and Dad came back to our room to read ” To Kill A Mockingbird”. I really like that book. It is funny, and creepy, like when the main character, Scout, her brother, Jem, and their friend, Dill, go out to explore the Radley House, which is the haunted house, and Jem gets his pants stuck on the fence and he lost them. And when Dill is taken away, and then he sneaks back and hides under Scout’s bed.

So Dad came back and read, and when he finished reading a chapter, he shut the light off and hugged us goodnight. Then Jean came in, and hugged us too, and then they told us to get some sleep. So I did.

About two and a half hours later, there was a knock on the door. I was half asleep, but I could hear about half of what was said. I don’t know if it was Jean or Dad that opened the door, but I heard it open and suddenly a man was talking. He was a very nice ranger. He very politely told us that we must move. And that our sewage was leaking.

Dad fixed the leaky sewage, and then we moved along and found a place to sleep. We didn’t get to go to Muir Woods the next day because we had moved down the road away from it.

I slept really well. And when I woke up, we were at a playground. That I didn’t get to go to.

Saturday, May 21st, after we picked up Dad from the airport and went to Bob and Ida’s, we decided to go back to Pacifica for one more night. It was the same campground that we had stayed at for two nights before, the one where we had the slot that was right at the edge of a sheer drop off into the Pacific Ocean. Remember? Well anyway, it was that campground that we stayed at, only for one night, though.

But before that, we needed to stop to let Dad and Jean check out the bikes. I’m not exactly sure why. But it didn’t matter because Ellie, Ana, Greta and I got to go play at the beach! I was soooo excited! I love, love, love going to the beach! But what I don’t like doing is looking at the nice, beautiful, blue ocean, but not being able to go. But when I heard that we got to play there, and I know I already said this, but I was really excited. Ellie and I shrieked and screamed as we tried to outrun the waves. It was probably the most fun time I’d had since… I’m not sure. Oh!!! Actually, I know exactly when! Since the last time I went to the beach! Which was, like, only five days ago!

Well, as we played, I got pretty wet. The waves were HUGE!!! ( By the way, the waves were a lot bigger than how that sounds. I just asked Jean and Dad what the limit on exclamation points was, since I had put 23, but they said the limit was 3! Can you believe it?! Well, since I wasn’t allowed to do 23 exclamation points, just know that the waves were way bigger than that. ‘Kay? Good.)

We played and had a great time, and then, sadly, we had to go to the campground.

Friday, May 20th, Ellie and Ana decided to try rollerblading. They put on their helmets and went for it. I would never have done this, but they decided, on their first try at rollerblading in their lives, that they’d go down the driveway. All the way down the driveway. They didn’t know how to brake or anything, and they didn’t have knee pads or elbow pads. They wiped out a lot on their first day rollerblading. It was fun to watch them, though, and I think it was for Greta, too. A little later that day, Greta decided to try it too. She said she had rollerbladed before, and she just needed to get used to the feeling, but she wiped out a few times when she was just getting the feel of them. Greta rollerbladed crazily on the first day, too, but started getting used to them. She could go pretty fast, and Ellie had gotten used to the feeling also. Ellie was pretty good at skating. Ana wasn’t able to go as fast as Ellie, and it was hard for her to keep her balance, but Ellie stayed back with Ana and helped her stay up straight.

Rollerblading at Mary's

Later that day, we went to Mary’s parents’ house. Before we had left, Ellie and Ana grabbed some rollerblades to take along the way. Greta saw them with them and I think she realized that it would be a lot more fun if she brought some too. So she brought some along with her. I watched them and had been watching them since the day before and they looked like they were having a great time together. So I sighed and decided that I would just have to bring some rollerblades also. I grabbed my helmet ( which I really don’t like because I’ve had it since I was four or five and I don’t understand how it still fits me, but anyway, I don’t like the pattern on it. To me, it looks like a baby pattern. It has polar-bears that are on surfboards on it. Yeah, surfboards are cool, but polar-bears? To add to all that, they’re cartoon polar-bears. And the surfboards have boring designs on them. ) and brought it and the rollerblades to the car.

We arrived. We all went inside and met Mary’s parents, then after a few minutes, Greta, Ana, Ellie, Olivia, and I were allowed to go outside and play on the skates. My sisters and I tried out our skates, and Olivia helped us and walked along with us when we skated around the block. It was fun and I was really careful about starting out without any knee or elbow pads, and I was surprised to find out that rollerblading was just a little bit harder version of plain old skating. It was a lot like ice-skating. And it was a lot of fun.

Finally we had to leave, and by then I had gotten really good at rollerblading. When we got back to Mary and Olivia’s house, we all skated until we had to go to bed.

The next morning, the day that we had to leave and pick up Dad from the airport so we could continue our trip, Saturday, May 21st, we planned to leave around 11:00 am. We ate breakfast and then rollerbladed for the rest of the time that we had at Mary and Olivia’s house before we had to leave.

Then we had to leave, which was sad, but we got to pick up Dad. We had a lot of fun rollerblading.

May 15th, after the Adventure Playground, my dad’s friend, Perry (who was awesome, by the way), gave us a big surprise.

Well, anyway, here’s the story. So, as we were walking back from the Adventure Playground, us sisters chatted with Perry’s son, Owen. He’s in third grade (like Ellie), he was really cool, and he was really smart, too. He had shown us around his house, which is a boat, by the way, and he introduced me, Ellie, Ana, and Greta to his two cats, and what he called his “evil bunny”. The bunny didn’t seem very evil to me, but whatever. Owen knows much better than me.

So, we walked back to the RV, and chatted with Owen, and along the way, I picked a couple pieces of dill off the bushes and snacked on it. It was good; it tasted like licorice. Yum… So anyway, we made it back to the parking lot. I wasn’t sure what we would have done besides that, but Perry led us to a Coast Guard trailer. He opened it up and rolled out… Coastie!

Coastie's Uncle is a Cutter

Coastie was weird. I could only guess what it was, and I just guessed a little model for Perry’s work, but I was completely off. Coastie rolled around on wheels, and Perry used a remote control thing to make it go places. Greta had headphones with a mouth-piece and whenever she talked, the Coastie thing would say exactly what she was saying, but in a much higher voice. Owen also made Coastie talk, and Coastie told us about himself.

We had a lot of fun with Coastie that day. We’ll have more tomorrow!