A Weekend on Roi

We have always loved Roi. It's where D and I lived when we first moved here so it has a special place in our hearts.  I had hoped to take the kids up there sooner but the flights always seemed full- because of the travel ban, Roi is the only vacation option for people on Kwaj and we never seemed to be able to get seats for six on the plane.  

  When some family friends said they were going up, it seemed like a great chance to head up there for a little get away.  We flew up on Saturday afternoon and back on Tuesday morning and the kids had a great time. 

All smiles to be back on a plane and heading somewhere new!

We spent the first evening settling in to our rooms and playing on the porch at the bar.  The kids played baggo, cards, and tag and Fire took pictures of it all with my phone.

I'm so thankful we followed a friend's advice and brought the Nintendo Switch!  I know some of you might say that it's frivolous but being able to replicate the kids regular routine of a little bit of screen time after breakfast made things go a lot smoother.  We've learned that behaviors in new places are easier to manage in a framework that includes as much of their usual schedule as possible. 

We got a cart that morning and our first stop was to see if there were any chickens at the northern end of the island.  Sky in particular was looking forward to feeding them since she remembered doing it when we lived here before but we never found any.

Fire is really into World War II history so we piled back into the cart to see all the buildings left over from the war.  All the kids were really impressed and Fire asked a ton of great questions.

 

Sometimes, you just need a lift from Daddy...

 

Me and my girl!

 

Water took a picture of me-

 

and then we made faces for the camera!

Afternoons on Roi have always meant beach time and we were really excited to take the kids to our favorite one.  We spent so much time here when we lived on Roi and it still feels a little like home.

Sky, always creating and building

 

Another thing I was excited to share with the kids- hermit crabs love potato chips!  If you sprinkle a few crumbs in the sand, they'll come running for them

Getting artsy with some broken machinery on a seawall

 

We had a picnic dinner at the Gabby shack that night to watch the sunset.  The kids played, the grown ups talked and the sunset was gorgeous- the perfect end to the day.

The next morning started with some tree climbing while we waited to pick up the cart

And then we headed to one of the more remote beaches for some exploring

If you can climb it, you can jump off of it (although I'm not sure the kids should have been doing either)!

After lunch we hit the Surf shack for one more afternoon at the beach.  D and I caught up with old friends while the kids played in the water and everyone had a good time. 

   While there were definitely some challenging parts to the weekend, I'm glad we went.  It was great to get away with the kids and explore some place new.  Going with friends added it's own joys and challenges but now that we've done it once, everyone knows what to expect and we can have even more fun next time.