114. Maple Grove Park

The days are getting longer and warmer and after-daycare playground season is about to get underway!  This time we went to Maple Grove Park and Charlotte especially liked crawling through the tunnel and poking her head out of one of the three holes like a mole in a "Whack-a-Mole" game.  She played for a while, then I asked her to come with me to find the park's geocache "Excel in the Park" - but she was having none of it.  Next time, the rule is that we find the geocache first and then we get to play!  The playground is located at N49.13.423 W123.09.561 and is point no. 114 on the map at the bottom of home page.

94. Dover Park, Richmond

These days, it’s pretty much dark by the time I pick Charlotte up from daycare, but this little park is fairly well lit, so I figured Charlotte could have some fun – and I could collect a geocache afterwards! But it was so cold… Charlotte did a little bit of playing and then I gave her a push on the swings – on the understanding that we would then go and get the geocache, which was only about 60 metres away. But when she had finished on the swings, she reneged on her promise! “I ended up going back for the cache, "CoRGQ #16 – Dover Park" a couple of days later on my lunch break. The playground is located at N 49.10.315 W 123.09.731 and is point no. 94 on the map at the bottom of home page.

90. Paulik Park, Richmond

Charlotte and I came here after daycare to get a geocache and hit the playground.  Only problem was it was dark by the time we got there!  She brandished the flashlight in the dark and announced that it was "fun" - but we never did find the cache.  We got spooked by a muggle who ended up walking with us to the playground along with his dog, Ronno.  The playground was much too big for Charlotte, it was freezing out and it was just a bit of a fail.  I went back the next day to nab the cache though - it was one of the City of Richmond GeoQuest caches and was quite easy to find in the daylight!  The playground is located at N 49.09.498 W123.07.287 and is point no. 90 on the map at the bottom of home page.

86. Garden City Park, Richmond

How is that we have gone almost all year without visiting this amazing playground so close to work and daycare?!?  The days are so short now that we did most of our playing in the dark, but it was still pretty amazing.  "I love this playground!" Charlotte announced as she headed yet again for the dodgy steps up to the super-long slide that wasn't too fast or too slow, but was just right.  She didn't like the steps at first and would make me hold her hand as she climbed them, then I would run down again to catch her at the bottom.  I was proud of her when she got brave enough to do them by herself, though I didn't get as much exercise out of it when that happened!  Charlotte doesn't like to be crowded when she's getting ready to go down the slide, so when two older boys were jostling her at the top, I asked them to wait until she had gone down.  She was half-way down when they came barrelling down behind her, knocking into her and sending her flying.  She was quite upset and cried hard, but she was more surprised than anything.  That didn't stop me from angrily telling the boys that I had asked them to wait.  At least the parents came rushing up and apologized to us and dealt with their kids.

 

Charlotte and I went off to explore other parts of the playground while she recovered from her little trauma; it's made from natural materials for the most part and is pretty amazing.  There is a giant crowsnest in the middle of the playground with several ways up, none of which Charlotte is ready for yet.  When she is, my heart will be in my throat as it's very tall and designed to be challenging for sure.  She recovered from her incident on the slide and was soon back at it again.  It was all I could do to tear her away to go home for dinner and the geocache that was hidden nearby was completely out of the question!  I ended up going back the next day during my lunch break to find "CoRGQ #18 - Trees Galore".  A new challenge to take up - the Richmond GeoQuest!  The playground is located at N 49.09.917 W 123.07.363 and is point #86 on the map at the bottom of home page.

84. Blundell Elementary School, Richmond

It wasn't raining after daycare today, so we went to check out a playground that I had recently noticed while taking Theo for a lunch-time walk.  Although it's an elementary school playground, it didn't seem to be too much for Charlotte.  Until we got there, that is...

The playground is quite old school and Charlotte banged her face just a few minutes after we arrived while trying to climb a ladder - a ladder that had an overhanging piece of wood at the top that made it hard to climb over.  I cheered her up and helped her try again - she had fun on the slide, but she was done with climbing.  She had a go on the swings and we hung out in the little playhouse and warmed our hands - and that was all she was up for.  The playground is located at N 49.09.262 W 123.09.158 and is point no. 85 on the map at the bottom of home page.

77. Riverview Park, Vancouver

Our first post-daycare outing in quite some time! The days are noticeably shorter than they were last time we went out after daycare and fall is definitely in the air. We found “Another Marpole Hide” first; I was so proud of my girl who wanted to open the cache herself, then said “Please have the log book?” so that she could sign it herself. She is getting to be quite the little geocacher! We headed over to the playground and Charlotte met a little boy named Mason, who was just a little bit younger than her. They played a little bit and did a brilliant job of taking turns driving the train. I heard from Mason's dad about the new playground in Terra Nova that opened while we were on vacation and that everyone has been telling me about. I told him about John Storvik playground in Anacortes, but I'm not sure he's willing to make the trek! The playground is point #77 on the map at the bottom of home page.

52. Schoolhouse Park, Guemes Island, Washington

I found myself with a Wednesday off work to look after Charlotte while her daycare was closed for a couple of weeks. I was looking to make an adventure out of my mid-week, day-long vacation and so we got up early (ish) and headed Stateside to picturesque Anacortes for the day. I have been through here many times and I wanted to bring Charlotte to visit this lovely spot that has such good associations for me, especially as I have ridden here on my bike at least a couple of times before. I had always wanted to take the ferry to Guemes Island and I figured that this would be the perfect opportunity: Charlotte would love bouncing over the waves, we could do some geocaching and maybe we would find a playground to hang out at for a while. The caching at the local beaches was so much fun that at first, Charlotte didn't even want to go to the playground! Throwing rocks into the water for Theo was pretty distracting... But eventually we headed inland and found the park, right in the middle of the island in a lovely, rural setting with no noise but the whisper of the wind and the chirping of the birds. The park was deserted when we first arrived, even though it was a lovely summer morning. Charlotte did some climbing and sliding while Theo and I made the most of some shade. Some big kids came up on their bikes with their parents just before we were starting to think about going, but they didn't seem interested in playing with little Charlotte and her big dog. There are no caches in the park, but in addition to the two we'd already found, we logged a couple more before we figured we'd better head back to Anacortes before the weekly dangerous cargo sailing held us up for longer than we would have liked. The playground is located at N 48.32.957 W 122.37.465 and is point 52 on the map at the bottom of home page.

34. King George Park, Richmond

I made a bit of a mistake today! I had physio this evening, but I thought we had time for a playground visit that didn't take us too far off our route home. We were delayed at daycare for a long time though – lately Charlotte has taken to wanting “hugs first” before she gets into her car seat. This does not mean a quick hug and she jumps into her seat – it means a long cuddle while we chat about her day and even the promise of a playground will not speed her up. Not that I want to speed her up really as it's very nice to have such cuddles, but they do cut into our playground time! I should probably have skipped the playground this time around, but I had promised...

 

King George Park is quite a large park in Richmond – big enough to have tennis courts and other amenities and playgrounds at both ends of it. We hit the west one – just because there was parking close by. The waterpark was going at full tilt, but I managed to divert Charlotte around that for today. She climbed on the playground for a bit and then... a diaper change was in order. Stat. So I had to convince her to return to the car with me, and that didn't go over so well. By the time it was all done, we really didn't have time to go back and play some more, and that was that. She cried and cried and cried and we made it home just in time for her to go to our neighbour's place while I zoomed off to physio. We will have to make a return visit – we didn't get to check out all of the west playground, never mind the east. We'll go back on another hot day when we're more equipped for the water park! We also might need to plant a geocache here since the park, amazingly, has none of its own. The playground is located at N 49.10.976 W 123.05.365: https://mapsengine.google.com/map/edit?mid=z7IAXiVD2wGY.ke14vi-3MYtI&pli=1