This year for the 4th we hit the road for a little adventure. Josh had a busuness trip to Wenatchee (about 3 1/2 hours from here), so we tagged along for the ride. Leavenworth was only 30 minutes from there (a "Bavarian Village" town) and had some fun activities to offer for the holiday!
The July 4th weekend they have a festival called "Kinderfest", with a huge carnival for kids. It was also the opening night for The Sound of Music at an outdoor theater!
Known today as the Apple Capital of the World, Wenatchee is one of the world's largest producers of apples, thanks to its accessible water source (Columbia River), which irrigates the sprawling orchards. Today there are more than 170,000 acres of orchards! They don't just grow apples. Cherries, peaches, grapes, are just a few of the fruits you'll see.
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| Huge, delicious cherries! |
A mini Pike-Place (in my opinion much better and cleaner), Pybus Place is a renovated steel warehouse, filled with shops, fruit stands and restaurants.
We ate lunch at the fire grilled pizza place "Fire", then enjoyed some yummy dessert (Gelato) from the neighboring restaurant "Ice". Delicious!
After lunch we headed up to Leavenworth and checked into our hotel while Josh finished up his meetings and then biked the 22 miles to meet us.
We had a last-minute addition to our party of Nana and Papa! When we read that the Sound of Music show would be preceded by a restaurant special of Prime Rib, we thought immediately of Stewart, and wished he could join us (those are a few of his favorite things!) We were so excited that a good flight deal and our shared hotel room allowed them both to join us for a couple days! The kids were so excited.
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| Gorgeous flowers and amazing views of the Cascade Mountains! |
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| They had these beautiful murals on the walls of our hotel |
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| A picture of a guy taking a picture of his dog :) |
On the 4th they kick off Kinderfest with a kids' bike parade! A local bike shop provided decorations for the kids to decorate their bikes. We were able to check out a couple cruiser bikes for Nana and Papa to join us, although I know hey were missing the gears on the hills! Ugh.
On the Main Street, they had a huge, free carnival for the kids. Dozens of booths, free cotton candy, popcorn, snow cones, cupcake walk, music etc. It was really something!
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| Hot dogs and brats at Munchen Haus |
After lunch we headed back to the hotel for naps and swimming.
That evening we went to see The Sound of Music. Our front-row seats were great, and although some actors were more convincing than others, the venue and music were a real treat! Diddles lasted til intermission, and Josh drove us back to the hotel. She fell asleep 5 minutes after getting into bed! So, not our traditional fireworks and BBQ, but it was a fun day for sure!
The next morning we only had a few hours to see a few more sites. Leavenworth has an amazing Nutcracker Museum. The owner (Arlene Wagner) used to be a ballet instructor, and over the years she accumulated a number of nutcrackers, fostering her love for the ballet "The Nutcracker". The museum has over 6,000 nutcrackers from all over the world. It was positively amazing. I never knew there were so many varieties and designs to crack a nut!
Finally, we stopped at The Hat Shop, with every kind of hat known to man!
After that we had to hit the road for home and say goodbye to Nana and Papa. It was a fun little getaway, and we all had a really great time!
2 comments:
What a fun holiday weekend at touristy/cool places. Looks like a beautiful area! And, looks like you're getting a lot of use out of the family bikes! Did anyone bring home a hat?
Looks like a fun trip! I'm a little concerned about the hat store, though ... go read my post about the last day of school and you'll see why. ;) I'll never be the same again.
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