Vashon Dunes

Every year we gather on Vashon Island to celebrate a family reunion with Erik's extended family. His great-aunt (she's 97!) still lives in the farmhouse where she was born, and she graciously allows 20+ adults, an ever-growing number of kids (this year there were 11 with more on the way) and a handful of dogs to invade her usually quiet home. We eat, take naps, play on the beach, eat, pick blackberries, fish for flounder and dogfish, eat, read the latest novels, go for walks, eat, and...eat. I think I gained 6 pounds and took 500 pictures while we were there this year, so it has been quite a chore trying to work off that weight AND get those photos all organized, but I thought I'd start with these. (The exercise can wait, right?)

When Erik was a kid, one of his favorite things to do at Vashon was go with his cousins down the beach to the sand dunes. They would spend HOURS running up and down the sandy hill. Now the cousins are passing along the dunes tradition to the next generation.

I had to back up quite a way to show just how high up they were. It's no little hill...

What do you do on a huge hill made of sand?

Jump down, of course!

Here's Erik in action:

His cousin...

And then this young punk showed us how to REALLY do it.

Yep, he definitely took it up a notch. Let's see that mid-air shot again...

Awesome.