Photos

I thought it would be good to show you a few pictures I've taken since we moved here. After all, I've told you how the area is so pretty and everything. I definitely haven't taken pictures of everything pretty, but I'd like to give you a little taste of life up here and the scenery.
A couple of weeks ago, we drove from Port Angeles, where Kirsten's Grandpa lives, 90 minutes or so away, up past the Olympic National Park, past Crescent Lake, to one of Kirsten's favorite spots, Second Beach. (We also passed First Beach, but we stopped before Third Beach. For real.) Crescent Lake is amazingly blue as well as amazingly deep. There's an old story about a couple in the 20's who went from Forks down to Port Angeles (or something like that) and drove on the road that goes a few feet away from the edge of Crescent Lake. They were buying a washing machine. The folks who sold them the washing machine were the last people to see this couple alive. Somewhere between the appliance store and their home on the other side of the lake, they ran off the road and into the lake. And this lake is deep enough, and the sides steep enough, that some divers just recently found the couple, their car, and the washer at the bottom of the lake. I may have botched a small detail or two, but that's more or less the story as we heard it from Grandpa on the way past the lake. It was a beautiful day, and it was hard to tell the difference between the reflection of the blue sky on the surface of the lake and the blue of the water itself. I took this picture out the car window as we drove past. Click to zoom in a little bit.
We got to Second Beach, and even though the weather there was really grey and a little cold, I could still see what a special place it is. After a mile-long trail through the woods of an indian reservation, we came out onto the beach at a huge pile of sun-bleached driftwood that we had to climb over to get onto the beach itself. Again, click to zoom.
The rock formations and cliffs in and near the water made it look like pirate ships should come into view at any minute. As far as I know, the Pacific coast west of Washington and below Alaska is not exactly a pirate-infested area, but it was still fun to think about. Check out the pine trees way up on top of this solo rock. (Click it.)
There was also a little hole in the rock where the tide came from two directions and splashed up all violently every so often and sprayed every which way. Pretty cool.
Second Beach also has a bunch of tide pools that fill up at high tide as well as big rocks sitting in the shallow surf, and both of these have a bunch of little creatures and plants to check out and, in some cases, avoid stepping on barefoot. Kirsten found a really cool little creature, an Ochre sea star, Pisaster ochraceus. There were quite a few of them around. We spent about two hours at the beach altogether, but our toes were freezing, and the wind was making it pretty chilly, so we didn't stay the whole afternoon. Second Beach is a really great place, though. The next time any of you visit, we'll have to see if we can take a trip all the way over there. You'll like it.
A little closer to home, in Bremerton, is Gold Mountain Golf Course. Kirsten's dad offered to treat us both to a round of golf recently. I'd gone right after we got here and made solid contact on about three swings total (That's out of eighteen holes, so close to... let's see... 200 swings altogether?), so I was about ready to take a pass on one round and be Kirsten's caddy. It was nice that way, and much less frustrating. It was a nice day, and the course is beautiful as well. Here's a picture from a spot where I remembered that I had a camera in my pocket and snapped one before running to catch up with Kirsten and give her the right club.
And here's Kirsten teeing off on the next hole. Notice the new haircut.
Aren't golf courses pretty? I think so. Frustrating, awful, godforsaken, and whatever else you want to call them, for sure, but pretty.
And that about wraps things up. Kirsten did take this picture of me offering resumes to anyone that wanted one from me in downtown Seattle. I was hoping someone would come by, take one, and offer me a job on the spot. No such luck, but it's a fun picture.
We've said on many occasions that we should be taking more pictures of our life. If we start taking our own advice more, maybe I'll do a photo blitz like this again. Stay tuned. I hope you enjoyed a little glimpse into what we've been up to. (A lot of what we've really been up to involves lying around the house like unemployed slackers with no friends, reading books, or watching excessive amounts of Food Network, but that's not nearly as exciting.)
Tune in Tuesday or Wednesday for interview reporting.

Kent