Before we dive into this week’s post on Olympic National Park day trips, we would like to congratulate and thank Cassie Lentz for sharing her Lake Quinault story. Send us an email and we’ll get your $25 Mill 109 gift certificate in the mail!

OK, now to the adventure!

As the second of five of our favorite Olympic National Park daytrips, this week we are featuring Kalaloch and Ruby Beach.

We start our trip at the Kalaloch (pronounced clay-lock) Lodge which is located on the southwest coast of the Olympic Peninsula and approximately a 60-mile drive from Pacific Beach, WA.  The drive does not follow the coast line as there is no road through the Quinault Tribal reservation, but it will take you through beautiful areas on the peninsula and past Lake Quinault which we featured in our last Olympic National Park daytrip blog.

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Whew, this was a tough one. Earlier this summer, we asked you all to share your favorite things to do while at Seabrook. In a short time we received a lot of really good responses from both homeowners and guests! While that made it difficult to select the winner of the contest, we finally found one post that comprehensively summarized many fun things to do while on the Washington coast.

So without further ado, please join us in congratulating Dana H. for being the winner of Seabrook’s summer contest!!

Dana will receive a $50 Gift Certificate to Seabrook’s favorite dining spot, the Mill 109 Restaurant & Pub. Her response was very well written and had a very unique perspective given the fact that she lives in Arizona. Here is what she wrote:

Coming from hot Arizona, Seabrook is always a welcome relief from the dust and heat.

The top things that we have done in Seabrook and the Seabrook area are as follows:

• Relax. Seabrook is very laid back and it’s easy to just relax and kick back for a while
• Watch a movie. Most, if not all rental homes have a DVD player and after the drive from Seattle it is nice to just sit down, relax, and watch a movie to unwind.
• Cool Off. Especially for people like me coming from out of state it is nice to be somewhere it can be sunny and cool, cloudy and cool, or windy and cold. Any one of these is better than where I am coming from and an enjoyable experience. A great memory I have from Seabrook is sitting by the fire outside watching the mist “rolling through the air” from the trees. Hard to explain, just something that has to be experienced!

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Ever since its release, our Lily Walk neighborhood has been immensely popular among buyers and Seabrook Cottage Rentals guests!

Even now, after all 17 homes have been gobbled up and the neighborhood is completely sold out, people are still interested in finding out more about these lovely beach homes.

That is why our design team has been working long and hard on implementing a similar neighborhood to Lily Walk in other parts of Seabrook. In fact, we are all but ready to release our brand new neighborhood, Madison Lane!

Madison Lane will be a neighborhood outfitted with similar house styles to those found in Lily Walk and will be a little closer to the center of town and the beach.

If Lily Walk & Madison Lane aren’t your style, then get excited for our other upcoming East Main neighborhood, Madison Lane’s “Seabrook Avenue” neighbor. For more information on Madison Lane and East Main cottages, stay tuned to the Seabrook Blog. A big announcement is coming soon!

Don’t want to wait? Then check out Seabrook’s Front Street Townhomes – incredibly priced and situated just a stone’s throw away from the beach and retail district! This is the best way to be super close to the ocean without buying an oceanfront house!

Many of you have probably witnessed all the growth Seabrook’s experienced lately. If you haven’t yet, browse our available vacation rentals and pick your favorite beach cottage!

In the meantime, we’ve prepared a slideshow of the latest Lily Walk progress…enjoy!

Thousands of people from the Pacific Northwest (and beyond) visit Seabrook each year in pursuit of a good time at the beach. And why wouldn’t they? Seabrook is the only place on the Washington coast that offers high-quality lodging, free bikes for cruising around town, many different activities and amenities, and most importantly, access to the long sandy beaches of the central Washington coast!

Seabrook Cottage Rentals strives to make housing accommodations as comfortable and relaxing as possible for those who stay at Seabrook. To see what our guests think of our services, we ask each of them to complete a Cottage Rental Survey after their stay.

By getting direct feedback from our guests on a number of questions, we are able to pinpoint our strengths and identify areas that need further improvement.

This year, over 90% of Seabrook’s vacation rental visitors were extremely satisfied with their stay at Seabrook! Whoo-hoo!

We’d like to thank everyone that provided feedback about their time spent at our beach town. As a reward, we offered one FREE WEEKEND for the luckiest responder to our survey of the last 6 months. So without further ado, we present to you the winner!

Congratulations to Amanda Jones from North Seattle for winning the Cottage Rental Survey Contest!

Please email us at rewards@seabrookwa.com to learn how to claim your free weekend getaway. In addition, you will receive 4 tickets to the Ultimate Beach House, which is open for tours for only one more week!

A heartfelt thank you to everyone that comes and stays at Seabrook, especially those that participate in providing feedback to us. If you have stayed at one of our cozy cottages but have not had a chance to fill out the survey, contact us and we will send you the link to the survey online.

See you all at the beach!

Horseback riding is a very popular activity at Seabrook, so we decided to put together some interesting facts about horses we think everyone should know. Horses are gorgeous animals with a lot of character, and there are literally hundreds of useful tidbits one can learn about them. Today, however, we pick out the top 5 fun facts. Here are the ones that made the cut:

1. You Can Tell a Horse’s Age by its Teeth

Ever heard the sayings “straight from the horse’s mouth” and “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth”? Horse teeth have been fascinating for scientists for a long time, and it is generally believed that you can tell a horse’s age by counting its teeth. Wear and tear may also factor in determining the age of the horse, although there are still many that don’t believe in this method.

2. Horses Spend More Energy Lying Down!

This one is just the most counter-intuitive fact in the history of fun facts! But apparently it’s true, and it is the single most important reason why horses generally sleep standing up. Yep, you read that right, horses can sleep while standing. Okay, being hunted by vicious predators is also a key reason to sleep standing up, but it’s just more fun to think “saving” energy is the factor. To accomplish this feat, horses lock their legs in, and avoid falling over. When are humans going to evolve to that level?

3. Horses Can Drink 10 Gallons of Water A Day

Another very common saying is “you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink”. Apparently, though, if the horse decides to take a drink on its own, it can fit up to 10 gallons in a single day! That number is just astounding! Make sure to help your horse to a room-temperature water, however, as really cold water on a hot day can upset the horse’s digestive system.

4. A Horse’s Head Weighs 10+ Pounds on Average

Speaking of 10, imagine having a brain the size of a potato and your head weighing 10 pounds?!? 10 Pounds is about the weight of an average bowling ball! That is one heavy head! Makes you wonder, do horses have inherently strong neck muscles? Or inherently weak ones for that matter? If anyone has the answer of this, please enlighten us in the comment section below!

5. Horses See 2 Different Images from Their Eyes

Technically called monocular vision, horses can use both eyes to look at two different objects since they are on each side of their head. Hence, they can use one eye to watch the front, and another to watch the back in case predators are around. Or, if they are on the Washington Coast beach strolling around, they can look at the ocean and at the beautiful coastline at the same time! We’d love to borrow this “feature” at least for the Pacific Ocean sunsets?

Horses really are magnificent creatures, and we are very happy to have them be a part of Seabrook. Know any other interesting facts about horses? Share them with us below, and we can all learn from each other!