2014 Family Vacation To Bear Lake, Part 6: Bear Lake, The Sequel

Late Monday night Nathan's Uncle Steve (technically my uncle too) came up with his family and his boat.  Tuesday morning we hit the beach for 8+ hours of sun, water, boating, and sand.  It was another fabulous and perfect day for the beach.  The weather was hot, the skies blue, and the water was wonderful.  The only thing I wish I had was a water proof camera.  I missed a lot of fun shots because I didn't have one.  The next time we do anything water related, I'm getting a water proof camera.

We rented a water trampoline, a kayak, and two paddle boards.  The water trampoline was fun, even I took a short turn on it.  The kayak was fun, but I think everyone's favorite was the paddle boards.  Paddle boards were like really big surf boards with a paddle.  If you had good balance you could stand and paddle yourself around, or you could kneel and paddle.  I opted for the kneeling, although I did try to stand up.....I fell in.

Everyone had fun out on the boat, with water skiing, knee boarding, and tubing.  I didn't go out for the water skiing or knee boarding, but did take a turn on the tubing.  We went slow while I was on the tube.  Just as I had told them to go a little bit faster, a gust of wind came up causing some fantastic waves.....lets just say I caught air and almost fell out.   It was a little scary but really fun..

And with that came the end of our vacation.  When we were all worn out, sun kissed, and tired, we made our way back to the ranch house for dinner and bed.  Dinner was fantastic, we sauteed up some onions, green and red peppers and had them on hamburgers.  I got a second wind of energy and got most of our stuff collected from around the ranch house so we wouldn't be so rushed in the morning.

Wednesday morning we packed up, said our goodbyes to family and the ranch house.  I hope we go back there again soon.   On our way home, we stopped off at the Gossner Cheese Factory again to get more chocolate milk.  It was really nice to get home and sleep in my own bed.  Unpacking was tiring and I swear I'm still washing stuff from the trip.  I still have a mini-beach in the van, but it was well worth the effort and time.  So, there you have it my friends, our 2014 family vacation was not only a success but a fabulous and fun success.  Here's to many more just like it :)

The paddle board and those yellow dots are the water trampolines.  We had the middle one.

Digging the moat to the sand castle

Collecting sea shells (or should that be lake shells?)

Spider Monkey on the paddle board

So much fun!!

Beach babies

Hey!!  I want to go.

Splashin' in the waves.

My little niece cracks me up. 

We wore him out.

Sandy bum

Constructing the sand castle

The Sea Gulls sneaking up on our picnic.

Even Meow-meow got in on the building action.

That is one dirty baby

On our way home.  Looking forward to my bed.

2014 Family Vacation To Bear Lake, Part 5: Model T Ford

We rented a ranch house on North Pole Loop, next to the ranch house is a big red barn.  The guy who owns the ranch house and barn transformed the barn into an extra place to rent, but you rent it separate from the ranch house.  The barn has two floors, the top floor being the area you can rent, we didn't rent it and therefore didn't have access to use it.  The bottom level of the barn is where the owner and his wife live.  Don,is his name and he restores Model T Fords.  The front half of the lower level of the barn houses his Model T's.  As a matter of fact, the day we were leaving, they were all getting ready for a Model T car show that would be arriving the next day.  From what we gathered, the ranch house and barn annex is a very popular place to stay during the summer, Don is already pretty much booked for NEXT summer.

Monday afternoon, as we were all sitting around relaxing and trying to figure out what to do, Don came over and invited us to all take a tour, we got more than just a tour......we got to ride in one of his Model T's....a 1922 Model T.....with the hand crank to start the car and everything.  Don also has a work shop, and the front of the workshop he painted to look like an old gas station, it even has an old gas pump.  Don will take his Model T over and let people take pictures.  We happened to be there when Don got a delivery of a Model T with a Mother-in-law seat.  I didn't get pictures of that as it was still in the trailer.  But I did get plenty of other pictures.  There's even a video of us riding in the car, but I'll post that one to Facebook since I can't seem to get them to work on my blog.

While we were out having our ride in the Model T, a nice summer thunderstorm rolled in, and I got some neat pictures of that as well.

To wrap up our Monday, we had S'mores and toasted Starbursts around the campfire.  Perfect ending to a perfect day.

Selfie on a Model  T Ford

I love how all the kids are just enthralled by what Don is telling them

Showing them how to start the car

Out for a Sunday drive.... I feel all proper now.  LOL

I was going for the "terrified mother" look in this one

Lovely summer thunderstorm

2014 Family Vacation To Bear Lake, Part 4: Minnetonka Caves

We started out our Monday morning with pancakes and sausage.  We gathered everything for a delicious knock off Cafe Rio sweet pork and sweet chicken salad for our lunch.  Then we packed up and headed out to the "Jabba-The-Wonky" caves as Spider Monkey called it.

There were these adorable chipmunks hanging around.  I took way too many pictures of them but they were just TOO CUTE!!  There was a short hike down to the mouth of the cave.  The cave temperature was 40 degrees....too cold in my book, way too cold in my book.  But they were really pretty.  At the end of the cave, they turned out the lights, plunging everyone into pitch black darkness. It was so dark that you could not see your hand in front of your face.  I imagine that outer darkness would be like that and probably just as cold.....not a place I want to go to.  We did discover that Firecracker was wearing glow in the dark shoes, that was funny.  One of my favorite parts was walking out of the dark cold cave into the bright warm sun.  My hubby would disagree, he didn't want to come out of the cave and back into the heat.

We took a short drive down to one of the campsites and had our fabulous lunch.  We talked about what we would like to do the rest of the day.  After hiking some 800 odd stairs in the cave, we decided to head back to the ranch house to rest, regroup, and figure out what we wanted to do.  The babies went down for naps, as well as some adults.  Brent took the boys on a hike, Emily took the girls on an adventure, and the rest of us played games.

Jabba-The-Wonky Caves

My handsome-almost-14-Space-Man-Spiff

Spider Monkey and his "buddy"

See?  Cute!!!

The whole group ready to do some spelunking

This chipmunk was fat and really friendly.  I think he likes the handouts.

See?  Fat cute chipmunk.  It's a requirement to take lots of pictures.

Live Wire and her rock collecting kit she made.

Firecracker studying her rock finds.

Lion Heart looking so amused.

Tiger Lily and no jacket.  We tried and tried to convince them all that they would want jackets in the cave....but they didn't believe us that it would be cold.

Meow-meow was jabbering away in the caves.  I caught this picture mid jabber.  He looks very surprised.