Coeur D'Alene, Day 3

We spent our last day in CDA at the main beach.  We intended to do that the first day, but we found the other beach off our hike that served us just as well.  Keeping with our early starts, we pretty much had the place to ourselves for an hour, which was awesome though a little chilly.

We did bring some sand toys with us on the trip, so the kids tried to find the secret to building sandcastles without much luck.  

But as we learned in Oregon, the sand castle master is in our midst.

I don't recall exactly how long we were there, but it was probably 3-4 hours.  The kids had a blast, and the parents were set up with food, drinks, and even some beach reading under our big sunbrella!  When Owen started behaving like a puppy, and Hadley was his bossy owner bathing him in a sand pit, we knew it was getting close to time to go.

It began to get pretty hot and crowded around lunch time anyway, so we opted to trade in our prime spot on the beach for one in an air-conditioned Greek restaurant. But first, we had to check out the amazing wooden playground adjacent to the beach.

It was huge! And according to the sign, kids helped design it, so it was full of lots of fun pretend-play objects, levels, and moving floors, along with the usual swings and slides.  O and H had a great time exploring and playing hide and seek!

We also found another Mudgy Moose statue!

And that about did it for Coeur D'Alene.  We really enjoyed the picturesque water, towering evergreen forests, charming neighborhoods, tasty micro-breweries, quaint downtowns, and laid-back normalcy in the area.  Our long day back in the car was pretty uneventful, but we did meet up with my old elementary school friend, Stacy, who now resides in Missoula with her family!