Amelia was up again early and snuggled into bed with me this morning... The temperature drops quite a bit late in the night when the sun finally dips down. Will have to insist she wears her extra sleep sack tonight.
We all crawled out of bed around 9am and had cereal for breakfast. Ollie was dressed in a flash after I told him there were some kids here to play with. The friendly folks next door have 5 kids between the two families... Age range 5 to 10 years old. As Ollie was peeking out the window the "gang" of kids rode by on their bikes. He wanted Jonathan to get his pedal bike down for him, and I grabbed his helmet. The oldest, Sally, came by and said hi and was super friendly and sweet. Ollie jumped on his bike and joined them on their bike ride along the camp road. It was so sweet to see him pedaling to keep up... He hasn't been too interested in his pedal bike as it is tricky to get started on his own. His new motivation to keep up with his new buddies was a perfect thing for him to get his confidence up. He was motoring around in no time!!
We spied a site on the opposite side of the family we parked beside that opened up this morning and we moved our RV over so we could have a nicer view of the lake.
Jonathan pumped up the dinghy and used his awesome invention he crafted at home to quick-release the chariot wheels to, and we wheeled the boat down to the dock from our site up the hill. We were all geared up to go out and it was too windy. Our little electric motor was not powerful enough to combat the mini waves and on shore wind. So, we waited. And waited. Ollie paddled in the water and soaked his pants and hoody (still wearing his life jacket). He encouraged daddy to go swim with him... So dutiful daddy went to the end of the dock with Ollie and he jumped in. Yikes! Chilly! But Ollie jumped in like he said he would and almost panicked at the shock of the cold water. He held it together as daddy swam him to shore and Ollie climbed out. Once out, he was all smiles! Pretty cute.
We tied up the boat and walked back up to our site for some lunch. Our neighbours on the opposite side are an interesting older couple. The guy had said hello earlier when we were hauling our boat down. He had some advice on fishing for pike. They had been up at Ethel Lake and had caught loads. He was a big bellied guy with a grayish yellow ponytail and weathered face. He was rough but very friendly and invited Jonathan over later to chat about fishing. We had seen him picking mushrooms when we walked back to our site. When Jonathan popped over after lunch to say hello and get some more fishing tips, I went over with the kids, too. The couple were cooking up a huge fillet of pike and sauteeing batele mushrooms at the fire. She was a biologist and had worked for the peace corps and also for alaska fisheries. She knew all about the edible mushrooms around here and showed us the big batele mushrooms she was splitting up. Instead of gills on the underside, they have long tubular pores. They showed us all the food they were cooking up and described the delicious taste (but didn't offer a sampling, kinda funny). She told us about the shaggy mane mushrooms too so we would be on the look out. Oh, and they had two friendly Aussie shepherd dogs called Fred and Wilma.
Jonathan set up the slack line and all the kids really enjoyed playing on it. (Grown ups too). Sally, Micah, and Ezzie tried to get Oliver to eat a soap berry (edible but icky), but Ollie was too wary to eat it. Amelia tries one and didn't seem too fussed about the whole deal.
Ollie and Amelia did some rock art and painted a bug stick. Ollie worked quite hard on his painting and created a lovely work of art. Amelia watched for awhile (wearing her shell bead necklace grandma and papa had given them from Hawaii) and then squatted down and joined in. "Meemee try".
We gave up on the boating excursion. The wind never died down. The guy next door came over and drew us a little diagram on how to tie up our boat in this wind so it would not get damaged. We had already decided to go down and unload it all and haul it back up.
We socialized with the two families on and off during the day. Super nice folks... They love in Whitehorse and were headed up to Dawson City the next day too. Devon's mum owns and runs the Gold Rush RV park in the town. Sally, the 10 year old had already been pitching it to us as a place to stay and even said that if we say that "Sally sent us", we would get free shower tokens ;-). We decided we would try our luck there anyhow, since it was right in town and we could poke around the city easily.
Spaghetti dinner super late and kids into bed by 11pm. They went to sleep easily, which was lovely... They had such a busy day.
This was our second night at twin lakes... $12 per night. Pit toilets and free dry firewood. Self pay at the box. Pumps were not working for th water, but we had plenty in the RV tank Very nice!
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