Monday, September 23, 2019
Lightning Storm
On Saturday, September 7, a large lightning storm rolled into Seattle. There were over 100 flashes in the space of an hour - here's a video from our deck with three flashes in the space of 20 seconds!
Sunday, September 1, 2019
Iceland !
For the last week in August, we all went to Iceland for our big summer vacation. We spent a week exploring the southern coast of Iceland, doing lots of outdoor activities and seeing a beautiful country. Here's some of the top activities from our trip:
1. Exploring Reykajvik
Our first stop was the northernmost capital city in the world, the small city of Reykjavik. We landed at 9:30 in the morning and spent somewhat of a jet-lagged day there, but were able to see some of the main sites, including the view from the tallest church in town and a stop at the house where the Reagan-Gorbachev summit was held in 1986.
2. Snorkeling on the Rift Between the Continental Plates
The European tectonic plate and the North American tectonic plate meet in Iceland, and you can see where each ends; there is a valley of what has been filled in with lava between them. There is a lake at one point between them as well, and you can snorkel or dive in that lake. The water is incredibly clear, as it comes from the fissure having been filtered by the rocks for decades. We spent 30 minutes snorkeling through, well suited up in wet suits so as not to get too cold!
3. Lots of Waterfalls
We saw well over a hundred waterfalls over the course of the week - many streams cascading down mountainsides while we drove. We stopped at a few of the major waterfalls to hike or take photos.
4. Long and Windy Hike in Klaustar
The weather was a bit cold, dreary, and windy. We took one hike up along a waterfall and then along a ridge that was very windy and wet, and a bit longer than we had thought.
5. Beautiful Canyon
We took a hike in a beautiful canyon, though it started pouring while we were there and we all got pretty wet!
6. Boating among Icebergs
In the south-eastern corner of Iceland you are able to take boat rides in lagoons fed by glaciers that stretch down the mountains, with icebergs calving off before melting or heading out to sea. It was dreary weather but it cleared up and the sun shined for our outing!
7. Enjoying the Black Sandy Beach of Vik
We stayed two nights in an Air BnB in the town of Vik on the south coast. It's a beautiful town with a nice black sandy beach.
8. Hunting for Puffins
Vik is one of the prime spots to see puffins. While the end of August is late in the season, we were able to see many of them flying around and roosting in the cliffs near our house.
9. Lava Tunnel
Several of our activities were canceled due to weather - we weren't able to do our two main hikes, in Thorsmork or the summit of Snaefellsjokul. We decided to do another tour spur of the moment, which was a tour of a lava tube from an old volcano (now extinct!).
10. Beautiful Hike from Hellnar to Aranstarpi
Our final stop, Hellnar, is right on the coast, and there's a beautiful hour-long hike along the water to the neighboring town.
11. Long Hike On Snaefellsjokul
Our final hike was to a mountain ridge under the glacier Snaefellsjokul, in a national park on a peninsula in western Iceland.
1. Exploring Reykajvik
Our first stop was the northernmost capital city in the world, the small city of Reykjavik. We landed at 9:30 in the morning and spent somewhat of a jet-lagged day there, but were able to see some of the main sites, including the view from the tallest church in town and a stop at the house where the Reagan-Gorbachev summit was held in 1986.
2. Snorkeling on the Rift Between the Continental Plates
The European tectonic plate and the North American tectonic plate meet in Iceland, and you can see where each ends; there is a valley of what has been filled in with lava between them. There is a lake at one point between them as well, and you can snorkel or dive in that lake. The water is incredibly clear, as it comes from the fissure having been filtered by the rocks for decades. We spent 30 minutes snorkeling through, well suited up in wet suits so as not to get too cold!
3. Lots of Waterfalls
We saw well over a hundred waterfalls over the course of the week - many streams cascading down mountainsides while we drove. We stopped at a few of the major waterfalls to hike or take photos.
4. Long and Windy Hike in Klaustar
The weather was a bit cold, dreary, and windy. We took one hike up along a waterfall and then along a ridge that was very windy and wet, and a bit longer than we had thought.
5. Beautiful Canyon
We took a hike in a beautiful canyon, though it started pouring while we were there and we all got pretty wet!
6. Boating among Icebergs
In the south-eastern corner of Iceland you are able to take boat rides in lagoons fed by glaciers that stretch down the mountains, with icebergs calving off before melting or heading out to sea. It was dreary weather but it cleared up and the sun shined for our outing!
7. Enjoying the Black Sandy Beach of Vik
We stayed two nights in an Air BnB in the town of Vik on the south coast. It's a beautiful town with a nice black sandy beach.
8. Hunting for Puffins
Vik is one of the prime spots to see puffins. While the end of August is late in the season, we were able to see many of them flying around and roosting in the cliffs near our house.
9. Lava Tunnel
Several of our activities were canceled due to weather - we weren't able to do our two main hikes, in Thorsmork or the summit of Snaefellsjokul. We decided to do another tour spur of the moment, which was a tour of a lava tube from an old volcano (now extinct!).
10. Beautiful Hike from Hellnar to Aranstarpi
Our final stop, Hellnar, is right on the coast, and there's a beautiful hour-long hike along the water to the neighboring town.
11. Long Hike On Snaefellsjokul
Our final hike was to a mountain ridge under the glacier Snaefellsjokul, in a national park on a peninsula in western Iceland.
Sunday, August 18, 2019
Henry Turns 15 !
For Henry's fifteenth birthday, we had dinner at Din Tai Fung. During the day, Dad and Henry took the bus down to Seattle and went up to the top of Smith Tower, which, when it opened in the early 1900s, was the tallest building in the world outside of New York.
Camping on the Ocean
In mid-August, we went out to Shi-Shi Beach and took our first backpacking trip. While we've camped before, it has always been car-camping, where we drive to a campsite and unload. This is the first trip we took where we packed it all on our backs and hiked to the campsite. It was a 2-mile hike to the beach, and then we walked another 2 miles down the beach to find a nice spot. It's a popular beach for camping, there were probably 40 groups there, but spread over the 2.5 miles of beach meant we had no one within 100 yards of us and a nice stretch of sand in front of us.
We brought frisbees and cooked freeze-dried pasta, beef stroganoff, and chicken and dumplings, along with hot dogs and (of course) roasted marshmallows. It was a HEAVY load for all (we packed our water in rather than relying on filtering the streams running into the ocean) but it was downhill on the way in. The hike had lots of mud to slog through, but a beautiful trip through the forest to the beach.
The ocean was beautiful with rock stacks along the coast and a series of rock arches at the end of the beach, about a 10-minute walk from our campsite. The water, even in August, was far too cold to swim in, though we did see several otters swimming in the current, along with an eagle soaring above. A great trip!
We brought frisbees and cooked freeze-dried pasta, beef stroganoff, and chicken and dumplings, along with hot dogs and (of course) roasted marshmallows. It was a HEAVY load for all (we packed our water in rather than relying on filtering the streams running into the ocean) but it was downhill on the way in. The hike had lots of mud to slog through, but a beautiful trip through the forest to the beach.
The ocean was beautiful with rock stacks along the coast and a series of rock arches at the end of the beach, about a 10-minute walk from our campsite. The water, even in August, was far too cold to swim in, though we did see several otters swimming in the current, along with an eagle soaring above. A great trip!
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| The group before setting out on the hike |
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| Arrivign at the beach |
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| Jack and Henry walk ahead to scope out a campsite |
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| Point of Arches |
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| Joseph used his Civil Engineering training to construct a model of the Seattle skyline in the sand |
Time lapse of the sunset from our campsite!
Long video of the beach and campsite
Monday, August 5, 2019
Hiking Up Thorp Mountain
Continuing on our summer of hikes, Joseph, Henry, and Dad found an off-the-beaten path hike to Thorp Mountain and hiked it on a beautiful summer Saturday in August.
The hike left from a trailhead down a Forest Road north of Roslyn, and was just short of 8 miles round trip, with about 2500 ft of elevation gain. Along the way we passed a beautiful mountain lake, with campsites and people swimming there, and then up a steep mountainside through meadows of wildflowers to the summit. At the top there is a fire lookout and an amazing view of Lake Kachess and Rainier in the distance.
The hike left from a trailhead down a Forest Road north of Roslyn, and was just short of 8 miles round trip, with about 2500 ft of elevation gain. Along the way we passed a beautiful mountain lake, with campsites and people swimming there, and then up a steep mountainside through meadows of wildflowers to the summit. At the top there is a fire lookout and an amazing view of Lake Kachess and Rainier in the distance.
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