Photos from previous birthdays at be found at:
5th Birthday Party
4th Birthday Party
1st Birthday Party
When I got back to the dock, it was almost 1:30 p.m.. Hunter was getting everyone organized to go to the Hamburger Hut. I ended up driving down to the Lassen View Resort with Tomasin, Drew, Morgan and
Jack in the truck. We had a nice afternoon sitting on the deck at the Hamburger Hut and enjoying the view of the lake.
After all of these years of going there, it is difficult to believe that the Lassen View Resort and the Hamburger Hut might not be there next year. The resort is in escrow and is apparently going to be sold for a subdivision.
After we got back, Tomasin and I started playing cribbage on the picnic tables. This attracted a fairly large crowd for the first couple of games. Tomasin whipped me the first two games, including muggins me for about a dozen points much to the crowd's delight. I ended up roaring back to win the next three games and take the set three games to two.
During the cribbage game, there was a lot of trash talking going on about horseshoes. Tomsain and I challenged Drew and David to a match. It is a very surreal experience to be playing Drew and David. They are both whole grow men at this point. Tomasin and I trashed them fairly easily; we won the first game 21 to 4 and the second game 21 to 10.
The Wallen's fixed dinner. After horseshoes, we sat and had drinks and appetizers in the front of their cabin. Jack insisted that I play cribbage against him during this time. The Wallen's served pasta for dinner.
The adults sat and enjoyed some CDs after dinner, including a copy of Drew's new album. It was interesting to listen to the other kids keep asking Drew if that was him on the album.
I finished up the night playing badminton with Jack.
After a late night, no one was moving very quickly on Tuesday morning. Sharon and I had set aside this day for a hike. She had a hiking book that described a hike that was actually very close to the Lake. Looking at a map over the last week, I was very interested in trying to reach this spot. The trailhead was about 11 miles off of highway 89 on dirt roads. After about 5 miles on the dirt road, we had climbed about 2,500 feet and had an amazing view of the Indian Valley to the south.
Unfortunately, the road was getting narrower and the side of the hill steeper. With five miles more to go to the trailhead, we made a decision to bail and turn around. This turned out to be an adventure. Sharon would not stay in the truck with Jack while I worked to turn the truck around the in a small bend in the road.
Getting back to the main road, we decide to regroup and head to the Bizz Johnson Trail. We went to the Mason Station Trailhead, had lunch and did a three mile hike. This part of the trail is not as nice as the section that we hiked two years ago.
Finishing the hike, we headed into Chester to do some shopping. It was our night to cook dinner for the group.
Back at the cabin, Jill Wallen and I took Jack out for a short tubing run. Sharon and I then started to get things organized to cook and serve dinner for 25 people. While we were working on dinner, I got a kick out of watching Tomasin and Wallen play horseshoes against Drew and David.
Sharon and I served drinks and appetizers before dinner. We cooked barbecued chicken, baked potatoes and salad for dinner and finished up the evening with ice cream sandwiches.
We finished up the evening watching the sunset over the lake and trying to figure out which planets were seeing in the night sky.