Our Trip to Isengard ... I mean Roozengaarde

Yesterday Ben woke up with the idea of going to the Tulip Festival up north. This idea sounded especially fun since the farthest north we have traveled, is to a Walmart 15 miles from our place.

Ben gets done with class on Fridays at 1:20 so I picked him up and 60 miles later we were at Roozengaarde (in Mount Vernon).

Here are some pictures of the Tulip Garden and the Tulip fields:



All of these tulip fields are harvested for the bulbs not the flowers so after a few weeks of enjoying the colors a machine comes by and lops the tops off to keep the petals from stealing energy and nutrients from the bulbs.




These were some of my favorite tulips:




After we went through the tulip gardens and drove around through the tulip fields we decided to stop over at Padilla Bay for a bit.



Sea life:



After a long day of exploring and sight-seeing we did what any sane person would do, we ate. Kiwanis hosts a annual Salmon BBQ during the Tulip Festival so we headed over to a park and had some delicious smoked salmon, potatoes, coleslaw, bread, and last but not least .. ice cream. Mmm.

Here's a picture of Ben enjoying the last remaining bites of this lovely feast:

It was a beautiful day. Before we left we were worried it might rain on us but we were able to just enjoy nature without any discomforts. Perfect.