We decided to stay down the highway from Olympia since the city didn’t have a good inexpensive campground. Sarah found a nice camp at Chehalis and we found a cool park in the town for the kids to play at. We always try to find nice playgrounds for the kids to get their energy out at because when your house is less than 300 square feet you don’t want three kids wrestling inside. The campground was a Good Sammember, so we finally joined a camping club and saved a little money. It will only take five nights of using the membership for it to pay for itself. The kids liked the camp too, since they found a secret forest clearing behind our trailer to play in.
We have had the pleasure of visiting quite a few capitols and I was a little worried we would get tired of visiting them. Boy was I wrong! Each capitol building has something unique to offer and we always learn something new. Olympia’s capitol was no exception and once again we learned from a tour guide. The chandelier is especially impressive because even though it doesn’t look that big when you look up at it, this thing is the size of a VW bug! Usually we try to visit a museum that Miles can get us into for free when we visit a capitol city. Olympia didn’t have one on the list though, so we found a free Japanese Garden to visit. It was probably the hardest place in the country to find parking for. After several passes we found a spot by a church behind the garden. We had to hike over a stream and travel behind several businesses to get there, but it was nice to walk around the tranquil garden. Much to my horror when we walked back to the car one of the back doors was wide open! My first thought was that someone had broke in, but we quickly realized that one of the kids had left the door open and we didn’t notice. Luckily nothing was amiss inside so no harm no four, but I definitely double check every time we leave the car to make sure all the doors are closed.