Last day in the RV

16 August 2018

Ah, I had such a good sleep last night! Laying off the bourbon was obviously a good idea!! I thought I’d heard Bugsy up and about with Cat saying that she wanted to find me for a cuddle, but as soon as she had found me, it turned out that she actually just wanted breakfast and to play with Tess…! Tess still in bed, so Cornelia had Cheerios while she waited for her new friend.

Being the lazy guests that we are, everyone was already up and about by the time we were surfaced. Pete went out to get donuts for breakfast, which tested my ability to resist to the limits! Cornelia was allowed half a chocolate donut as long as she promised not to turn into a sugar monster.

After breakfast, I had a shower, did a bit more of Cornelia’s scrapbook, and ensured we had all documents ready for cruise. Cat, Pete and Tess left shortly after 10:00, and we followed ten minutes later. It felt very strange saying goodbye to them (especially as they were leaving their own house before us!), and I feel as if we have already known them for so long! I do hope we will get to see them again. Mike was still there and was staying one more night before he was joining them in Idaho.

We drove for some time along the, occasionally complicated I5, diverting for a stop off at the Mt St Helen’s Visitor Centre. It was cloudy (or smoke hazy, perhaps), so our view of the volcano was virtually non-existent, but Ian and Bugsy went into the visitor centre to look around. I should’ve gone too really, as I hadn’t appreciated how long they would take, and paying $5 just to make sure Cornelia didn’t damage anything didn’t seem worth it (although in the grand scheme of things, this does now sound quite ridiculous!). I sat outside while they looked around, and after about 30 minutes, I went back in wondering what on earth could be taking them so long. The exhibition was really interesting apparently. Cornelia had been jumping up and down on an earthquake machine which records the seismic movements you can make. Ian, of course, wanted to read everything and between the two of them, they definitely had their money‘s worth.

When they finally returned, I suggested we had lunch there. I made a sandwich for Cornelia, and Ian and I had cheese and crackers. We are trying to use up all of our remaining food so that we don’t end up binning too much.

From there, we drove on to Seattle to our final campsite. It was a KOA site as most of ours have been, but by far the least impressive.

I was in the check-in office for about half an hour. There was one girl on reception, no manager had been made available and the people in front of us all seemed to have an issue with something. Thankfully, our check-in was simple and smooth and eventually, we made it to our site, at the end of a row of RVs. The campsite was completely packed out and they had no spare spaces at all. We pitched up and Ian and Cornelia went on a license plate hunt while I cooked our final meal. There was some pasta bolognese in the freezer still, so Ian and I had that with a cheese sauce that I made. Cornelia had scrambled eggs on toast at her request. We all watched a Smurfs movie so that Cornelia could wind down and we could get her to bed as early as possible. This turned out to be shortly after 20:00, and amazingly, she was asleep within the hour.