Christmas 2009

It's the time of the year to be merry! As is tradition now, we went to Fort Worden, at the edge of Port Townsend and rented one of the officer's houses in the Fort for 4 days to spend Christmas with our good Friends the Kinasts and the Yaquoubis.
After a bustling drive over the Tacoma Narrows bridge we got there on the 24th at around 2. This year we got a single family house. The entire row of houses was built in 1911-1913, providing for the commanding officers a commanding place with a commanding view to live in during their usually short residence at the fort. The fort was built during WWI to protect against potential invading Japanese troupes through the straight of San Juan de Fuca. As we know the Japanese never attacked and the fort was abandoned in 1943. But at the time the commanders decided to build a lavish set of residences with the most modern amenities such as running warm water and bathrooms to make the stay for the east coast Westport graduates palatable. They never liked the remote location so far away from their east coast homes and many dreaded the rainy winters. Well, their loss and we are left with wonderful houses, an enormous base, and the very scary/fun/adventurous bunkers along the ledge and cape of the tip of the Olympic Peninsula.

It's always great fun to hike up to the bunkers and explore the abandoned dark caves left behind. The whole area is pretty much left to rot, there are no safety measures to make anything safe to explore, and the whole thing spews of rotten old war era stuff. It feels a little like the sinking bunkers along the west coast of france. Unused, abandoned old concrete fortresses that now can serve as playground for the adventurous child.

At the tip of the cape, we could get a glimpse of Mount Rainier in the background.

And the the straight east, a clear view of Mount Baker. Snowboarding was invented there.

Just south, you can see the Fort, behind those white houses is officer's row.

We also saw a falcon fly over our heads. Watson was a little afraid of being scooped up and the next meal for this malicious predator.

One of the cool old gas stations at the fort. Americana in its purest form!

The weather was wonderful the whole time this year. We were treated to sunshine and 50 degree weather the whole time. And to us, 50 degree weather is shirt off weather.

There was also a good chunk of time we could spend at the beach. Due to the nice weather it was really pleasant. In past years we've had to really bundle up and protect ourselves against cold wind and rain blwoing from the southeast; last year we even had surfable waves. This year all sunshine!

The whole crew right before we left!

Great times also with drinking, Fondue, Turducken, and this wonderful Marzipan Chicken that Said made for us, it was a culinary journey through the Americana routed to the Moroccan specialties. Well, we reserved for next year again, so can't wait to be back!