On our way back from our day at the coast, not only did we have great timing to see the lighthouse all lit up, but we got to see the most breathtaking sunset over the ocean. (These pictures really don’t do it justice.) Hunting for fossils was fun and so was visiting the aquarium (not to mention the good food we enjoyed and didn’t have to cook ourselves, which is such a treat), but the highlight of the day for me, besides getting to spend time with my family and have an adventure day together, was seeing that sunset. (Last year I got to watch the sun rise over the ocean for the first time, when I was in Florida, and it was simply magical.)

Jeff pulled the car over twice so I could take pictures of it on our way home. The sunset made me stop and pause, there was nothing I could do but marvel at the beauty of it and hope to somehow capture a fraction of that beauty in my pictures. The second place we stopped to take pictures also happened to be a great place to see sea lions and there were more there that evening than we had ever seen in that spot before. We watched them far below on the beach, on the rocks, and swimming in the water.

That day was really just what we all needed- a break from all the tasks we were fully immersed in at home and a breath of fresh air before we dove back in. Simply a day away can be so regenerating on such a deep level, but then topping it off with that sunset was like overflowing the cup for me. Truly, witnessing that gorgeous sunset was the perfect ending to that day for us. We loved watching the boats all lit up, moving across the water. I was only able to capture a few in the frame of my lens, but there were many more boats on the ocean and the darker the sky became, the more they looked like stars scattered across the water.