Kelsi was in need of some daddy time on Sunday, so I packed up some goodies and took her up to Lake Ozette for a little hike.

We decided to take the south route to Sand Point as the destination is much more kid friendly: There’s big rocks to climb on and a long sandy beach with lots of driftwood to explore. Occasionally, if you get to the beach early after a storm you can find glass floats from fishing trawlers across the Pacific.

We set off early in the afternoon and Kelsi set the pace quite nicely. It was a Sunday afternoon so we met many groups of campers coming back from the beach after spending the weekend enjoying the sites. I also brought along a couple of my pocket guides to help her identify some of the plant life in the area. The bunchberry was first on our list. According to the guide, the berries may be used as a poultice to relieve the pain of burns.

Big Spruce

Next I showed her the blue huckleberries and bracken fern. Apparently, today we were learning about the B’s. Other prominent flora in this area is salal, hemlock, and the huge spruce trees along the trail.

We made it to the beach and naturally, she took her shoes right off. She played in the water a bit, we found some hermit crabs and watched the sculpins dart around in front of us for a while and then made our way to the driftwood piles for lunch.

Driftwood and the Trailhead Marker

I had a couple MRE’s and some MRE heaters in my pack so I broke them out and started heating up the entrees. While we were waiting for that we snacked on the other goodies I brought along. Once the MREs were warm I tore them open and she took a bite. Then promptly spit it out. I don’t remember them tasting that badly, but for some reason even I didn’t really care for them that day. I let her eat the good stuff I brought and I choked down the other stuff. I left about half of it on a log for the birds to snatch up, if they dared.

About a half mile into our return trip up the boardwalk, Kelsi started complaining of her feet hurting. I took off her shoes and despite my attempts at getting every bit of sand off her feet back at the beach, I apparently missed a few grains and she was getting a hot spot on the side of her foot. We decided to go barefoot. It was easy on the boardwalk sections, but we had to slow down a bit on the gravel. Regardless, we did really well and kept a pretty good pace even without our shoes. All in all we went about 2 miles barefoot. I made sure to get her shoes back on before the final section; about a half mile of gravel. I knew we couldn’t handle that much.

Kelsi's Frog

Before long, we were back at the car and on the road again. For dinner we stopped at a friends house on the Hoko road to pick up momma and we roasted hotdogs over a fire in their back yard. It was a nice relaxing Fathers Day.

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