Camping/Palm Springs Aerial Tram

On Friday after work my dad came over and picked us up and we headed out camping at San Jacinto State Park.  We met up with Sean and Amy, their kids, her parents, and Mary and her kids and David.  We purchased two campsites but had to put both large tents in the same campsite because the one next to it was on a steep incline.  There was no flat or semi flat area for a tent to go.   The evening park ranger was not thrilled with us but he allowed it for the night.  Quiet time was 10:00 so that became bedtime for everyone.  Once we were all settled, Chloe decided to have a meltdown.  She wasn't ready to go to sleep, but she settled in rather quickly and was off to sleep in no time.  Connor realized around 10:30 that he left his garbage truck in the car and wouldn't let us go to sleep without it.  I ventured to the car and retrieved the truck.  Back in the tent again we got cozy in our sleeping bags.  Around midnight Oliver woke up, he woke up again around 1:00am, 3am, and 5am.  He cried a bit and then went into full blown screams at 5am.  Many of the other campers in nearby campsites were not thrilled with us.  One screamed "Pick up your baby!"  I don't think they liked us.  I don't think any of the adults in our tent got much sleep.  Chloe and Connor managed to sleep through most of Oliver's cries. 

In the morning we all told Oliver he was on the naughty list.  After breakfast the morning park rangers came over to our campsite.  Apparently they had several complaints of noise from our campsite at night.  The ranger said if we were staying another night we would have to split into the other campsite and cook all meals separately.  We understood that the complaints were about Oliver screaming all night long, but even in two campsites he still would've done that.  The whole cooking in separate sites was a bit absurd though. 

After breakfast we cleaned up our stuff and loaded into the cars.  Two cars went for a hike somewhere, while our car headed to the Palm Springs Aerial Tram.  It was AMAZING!  Totally worth the cost!  It took us up about 6000 feet in about 10 minutes.

 Connor waits for his turn

 Here it comes

 While on the tram the floor rotated so everyone got a full view of the mountainside.  It was pretty awesome.  Once we got to the top we walked down a steep pathway and found some fun trails to explore.  Chloe found this giant rock that she was very excited to stand next to.

 She then found a Chloe sized rock

 Connor found a rather large walking stick.

 Chloe found a walking stick too.

Chloe then found a much larger walking stick but couldn't pick it up.

 Connor carried his walking stick for a little while.

 While on one trail we found this patch of snow.  The kids had a great time playing in it.  Grandpa threw a snowball at Connor and he turned around and said not to throw snowballs, we were not having a snowball fight.  A few minutes later Connor made a snowball and threw it at Grandpa and exclaimed, "Snowball fight!"

 Chloe enjoyed eating the snow, even though Mommy said No.

 Grandpa had fun in the snow too.

Here's one of the lookout view points we hiked to.

 I liked the view

 Here's the view from the top of the tram station looking down.

 Connor smiles inside the tram.

 The tram had a couple of open windows which let in a nice cool breeze.  It was also a little eerie looking down and out through them.

Afterwards Peter and I agreed this was the highlight of our trip.  We would totally do this again.

LA fun!

Thursday and Friday of last week were not technical school days for Connor and I...most of the teachers attended a Montessori conference in Philadelphia.  I chose not to go.  I ended up working Thursday, but then Friday we all had some fun.  Friday Peter had the day off of work and it was also his birthday so we took a little trip to LA to go to some awesome museums.  We took my dad with us and we all had a blast!  Our first stop was La Brea Tar Pits (Page Museum).  This was a short visit, but still pretty cool.  There were a TON of children on field trips there, so it was very crowded!  My favorite parts were seeing the tar just coming up out of the ground and a lake area that was bubbling.  There were several dig sites too, but we didn't go and see them.  It was really hot outside and we had more museums that we wanted to see, so we moved on.

Here's a panorama of the tar in the lake (above)

Entrance to the museum (below)

This is a Columbian Mammoth

These are Dire Wolves....On the opposite wall of this were over 200 skulls of dire wolves found in the tar pits.

Throughout the outside park like area were these yellow cones marking several tar pits.  Larger pits were surrounded by fencing.

From there we went to the California Science Center.  We went to see the Endeavor and then played with all the cool things in the museum.  Connor liked the area where we played with ping pong balls.

 Connor being a goof in front of the replica of the Mars Rover

 Astronaut suit

 above and below...potty for astronauts...this had a video that was very interesting to watch.

 Daddy and Chloe admire the underside of the Endeavor

Here's the Endeavor...pretty cool to see up close.  We watched a short video of what an intricate process it was to tow it to the science center.  It was pretty neat.  I remember watching it on TV a couple years ago.

Here's a panorama view of the Endeavor

 The museum also had a fish tank tunnel and this huge floor to ceiling tank.  The diver on the inside was feeding the sharks.

 They also had a tidepool area where the kids could touch the starfish, sea cucumber and anemones.

 Chloe had fun splashing in the water

 Grandpa and Chloe are checking out one of the tanks

 Chloe made a new friend

 These were hanging from the ceiling above the escalators

 Chloe and Grandpa played with gears

Connor put up giant foam pieces to build the walls of this house

This area was a lot of fun.  We could've spent hours here, but we had one more museum on our list to visit, so moved along...and went next door to the Natural History Museum.  They had two exhibits that Peter really wanted to see: the dinosaurs and the gem and minerals.

 Above Connor is a T Rex that looks like it's going to eat my kiddo...so Connor is afraid-though it looks a lot like his normal goofy pose too.

 Daddy's afraid too

 Here are some more critters

I didn't take pictures of any of the gems-mostly because there was an armed guard standing outside and photography just sounded a bit odd at that point.  We even went into a vault where they kept more gems...that was pretty cool too.

Overall we had a great time in LA and it was very cheap too.  We paid one adult, one child and one senior ticket to the dinosaur museum and tar pits together was $24.  Chloe was free, and CA teachers are free-I just showed a paycheck and my ID and I got in free.  The Science Museum was also free, though to see the Endeavor was $2 per person.  It was a great way to spend a day off of work and a great birthday for Peter.

Our weekend

Connor and Chloe love playing in the backyard at grandma and grandpa's house.

Chloe has figured out how to go up the stairs.

She also goes down the slide by herself.

Though, she freaks us out when she goes near the climbing wall.

On Saturday we went to the beach looking for tide pools.  The tide pools were okay, but we had more fun climbing on the rocks and playing in the sand.

We also went to Cabrillo Monument and walked around a little bit.  We also went to the lighthouse.  Cousin Camille enjoyed following Chloe around.

Oliver got buried in the sand at the beach.

Kirk and Claire decided to go for a swim....and then proceeded to complain about how cold they were back to the car.  (We all knew that was going to happen.)