NW Washington State (Silver Creek, WA)

We spent most of the summer exploring the Puget Sound area, so this post is going to be filled with a few more photos of all our recent activities.

From La Conner, we have salmon floating in the air...

an interesting hotel on the water...

and a Totem pole in front of one of La Conner's museums.

In Anacortes, we found it interesting to see a piano overlooking the marina...

and a beautiful garden along the sidewalk also overlooking the marina.

We took our son Shaun to Washington Park in Anacortes during his visit while we were in La Conner.  We were very lucky to see a Bald Eagle fly low over our heads.  Sorry, no photo.

The weather was not cooperating and started to drizzle so we did not spend as much time walking and looking around.

Gnarly Tree

We visited Blaine quite often along with a few restaurants with good food.  Hard to say which ones we liked better.

Blaine's city park is filled with blackberries.  We left a couple of times with a small grocery bag half full of ripe berries.

From the city park, we could see the Peace Arch at the Canada/U.S. border.

We did not spend all of our time in Blaine.  We did a little exploring of the surrounding area.

overlooking Blaine's marina

We had visited Lynden once before, but it was so long ago that it was like seeing it for the first time.  It is a very quaint town with Dutch heritage influencing the architecture of the downtown area complete with windmills.

We enjoyed walking the streets, viewing the buildings, and browsing through some of the shops and bakeries.

We spent one day driving to Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest.  First stop was to view the Nooksack Falls.  A little disappointing since we were fenced off from above the falls making it hard for us to see the whole waterfall.  Apparently, some people have a problem with the fence and do not heed the danger signs.  They have a list of several people dying because they wanted a closer look including a mother and her unborn child.  Such a shame.

Second stop was Heather Meadows with a spectacular view in every direction.

And filled with pink and white heathers.

We could not have picked a better day for perfect weather with plenty of sunshine, blue skies and fluffy clouds.

From Heather Meadows, we followed 542 to the end at Artist Point. 

 A very appropriate name with the breath-taking views all around us.

The day had actually become quite warm.  It was odd enough to see people walking in the snow with sandals, but watching them sledding down hills in shorts was even more odd to see.

The last place we visited was the  Historic Fairhaven area in Bellingham.  We spent the morning walking around the downtown area.  Browsed through the Farmer's Market setup in Fairhaven's Village Green and had a delicious lunch at the Colophon Cafe Restaurant.

Hmm, we did not see this one until after we had lunch.  Maybe next time we will stop here.

The downtown area had some interesting places and things to see while we walked off our lunch.

We ended up walking along the Taylor dock.  This dock curves around the point and comes back to land.  We did not go to the other end, but we read that it takes walkers to another city park and more walking trails.

Our next move was to Monroe for less than a week.  We were able to catch up with Sandy's brother and his wife Deb during their free time for lunch and an afternoon visit.  We were also able to spend one evening with Shaun at his new workplace with Kirkland City Hall in the IT office.

After having a pleasant visit with his co-workers and tour, we walked with Shaun to a downtown Turkish restaurant.

Where's the party?

Below is a photo of Shaun's "sometimes" temporary office. The WiFi is strong here, so he finds it easier to sit here when he is outside the office while solving an employee's IT problem online.  We are not sure how he gets any work done with that view, but apparently he does because we heard from a lot of his co-workers that they were grateful to have him working with them.

Now, that's an office with a view

The unique artwork scattered along the route we took to the restaurant and to the park were quite interesting.  The sidewalks were filled with people enjoying the warm evening.  There was a Farmer's Market in the park with live music.  We were beginning to wish we were able to stay longer.

We know we missed a lot of interesting sights, so you know what that means - we will have to visit Shaun and Kirkland's downtown area again.

We had to make an unscheduled stop to Camping World.  We were lucky that they were able to fit us into their busy schedule.  Our Splendide combination washer/dryer had died the week before.  A lot of people think it is easier to use the camps laundry facilities.  Even though the washer is small, we find it more convenient to wash a small load every day than to spent a couple of hours waiting on large loads of laundry.  For us, it was worth spending the day in the CW's parking lot trying to keep four cats cool and calm on one of the hottest days of this summer.  We are not so sure our cats would agree with us on that one.  They did not like sitting in our Honda Fit.  We were able to give them short breaks from the car by letting them sit on a shady grass covered medium near the car until our shade went away.  All four blew enough of their coats inside the car to start another litter of kittens!

View of  Mt. Rainier from Ft. Lewis

While we were waiting for our appointment, we were able to get some shopping done at the Joint Base Lewis McChord.  The view of Mt. Rainier from the Ft. Lewis Exchange parking lot was spectacular.  

We are settled in Silver Creek, WA until after Labor Day.  Hopefully, the crowds will start to slow down after the holiday weekend.  We are not too far from Mt. Rainier and Mt. St. Helens National Parks, so we might try to see one or both before we move south to Oregon.

Happy Trails!  

Travel Log Pacific NW (Mount Vernon, WA)

Rest stop in Colorado

A lot of miles traveled and a lot has happened since our last blog.  We made it to Washington State in one piece, but not without adventures.  We would have posted earlier, but our WiFi has been weak.  We are happy to say that we are connected once again.....well, sort of.  It is still slow, but the campground's lodge WiFi is decent for bulk software updates.

Back to our cross-country travel:   We managed to miss the worst flooding and hail storms in Texas by a couple of weeks.  We kept our visit short with our daughter in OK to get to Spokane WA to see Dan's ailing parents.

We enjoyed a great meal and an interesting one night stay at Terry Bison Ranch in Wyoming.  So many animals to see and not all of them are the typical ranch animal.  A great place for families to visit.

'Give us a kiss!' - Terry Bison Ranch

The next day, our luck with decent early spring weather ended when we ran into heavy snow fall and closed roads while still in Wyoming.  The following morning looked quite a bit better and we left with hopes of finishing our trip to Spokane uneventfully.

Kaycee, WY

But uneventful - NOT!  The motorhome had a few problems. Two major ones were the exhaust brake was not working and a hose burst to our air system which is used for suspension and brakes. Dan was able to fix the exhaust brake problem. The air line leak was more major and we were lucky the line burst while we were parked at a truck stop. Dan called it our lucky breakdown because if it had happened on the mountain passes in a construction zone we would have been blocking the pass for hours (as the rear brakes lock when air pressure is lost). When air does not build up, the motorhome does not move. Dan was able to get a mobile RV/Truck service to source and replace the burst hose within a couple of hours.

Good Morning Colorado!
Lowered our blood pressure with this peaceful view for a few days.

We made good time through the rest of the states and spent a couple of weeks visiting Dan's family in Spokane.  When we left, we knew it would be the last time we would talk to Dan's Mom.  She passed away during the night on 3 July.  

Vivien Weaver May 1927 - July 2016

She will be missed not only by family, but by a great many Wenatchee HS graduates from her 19 years of service in our high school's Social Studies and English Resource Center along with coaching and taking the Knowledge Bowl and Academic Decathlon teams to State Competitions.

Weavers 1995

 After our goodbyes, we moved on to Crescent Bar in central Washington.

We were finally able to enjoy some sunshine since leaving Florida.  A little dry, but a pleasant change from a winter of humidity.

 We visited our old homes in Wenatchee and in Manson.  Wenatchee has changed and grown so big that the roads can no longer keep up with the traffic.

Lake Chelan, Manson, WA

 Manson, on the other hand, has done some growing, but not to the point that it has ruined the small lakeside town feel.

Manson's old library

We drove over the North Cascades highway to Concrete, WA.  The views never gets tiresome.  Of course, we have only gone through this pass a few times.

The road is a little narrow for our extra wide motorhome, but the views are spectacular.

The cats agreed that the campground in Concrete was wonderful with plenty of trees to climb, grass to roll in, and bushes to explore.

Hitch surveying his new surroundings.

They were in kitty heaven!  They actually protested when they realized we were getting ready to move.  Squirrel, Dusty, and Max all sat at the door howling as we packed.

Max and Squirrel relaxing in the shade.

We could not blame them.  We also enjoyed our time in Concrete filled with friendly people, good food, and very scenic surroundings.

Concrete named after the business the town produced

Since June, we have been bouncing around the Thousand Trails campground system in the Puget Sound area.  After Concrete, we moved to Blaine 

Across Blaine's marina, we can see Canada

Blaine

to La Conner

to Mount Vernon, and now we are back in Blaine for the next three weeks.  It is great to be back.   To be able to visit our favorite spots, to catch up with friends we have not heard from in years, and to visit with family as well.  It does feel like coming home. We were able to get together with Sandy's brother Steve and his wife Deb while our son Shaun was staying with us during the 4th of July weekend.

Shaun and Dan enjoying the view in Washington Park, Anacortes

One thing that is different for us is the legalization of recreational marijuana, but we are getting use to seeing the Marijuana shops throughout the state and smelling the smoke once in awhile.  (No, we are not partaking).

Blaine WA

Well, the sun is out and it is calling to us.  It is going to be a perfect day of 75 degrees and we should not waste a minute of it.  Until next time....

Happy Trails!

Good-bye Key West (Spokane, WA)

We said good-bye to Key West in early March.  We enjoyed our winter in Key West even with a month of cold fronts moving through the area.  It makes the sunny days all the more precious especially with all the bad weather going on up north.  It will probably be quite a few years before we return.

So, it looks like we need to do a little catching up since our last post was in September.  My!  How time flies!  The cats were not happy to leave.  They spent every day outside unless it was raining.  What can we say?  They are not ones for the wet fur look.

I like it here!  I don't want to leave!

Most of our time was spent hanging around Sigsbee Naval Base.  Taking long walks and looking for island wildlife was our biggest entertainment.

The Ibis and the Pelicans were our favorite birds to watch, but we were just as happy to watch the others as well.  

Spying Iguanas was another one of our favorite past times.

Plenty of old ones hanging around in the trees at the marina and in the grass near the PX/Commissary area.

Or swimming in the marina....

The younger ones seemed to like soaking up the sun near the waterfront.  We even had a couple of sightings of newborns sitting with their mamas on the rocks.

Our best sighting was of a manatee swimming around the base marina.  We were able to see the same one three times.  We identified this manatee by the propeller scars on it's back.  Even our son Shaun was lucky to watch the manatee.  On that day, we did not think he would get a good view of the manatee since it was out a good 30 feet from the dock.  All we could do was watch for it's snout coming up for air.  While watching for its snout, a small two-man catamaran sail came through the marina area and accidentally slid right across the manatee's back.  The surprised manatee bucked a good two feet out of the water causing the catamaran to rock but did not tip over.  Considering the man was standing at the time, we were surprised he did not end up in the water.  The manatee shot over to the docks almost to where we were standing.  We are pretty sure the manatee was more startled than hurt.  Afterwards, we were able to follow the manatee around for quite sometime as it stayed close to the docks or underneath and away from the scary boats.

The following two pictures were taken in October to show the empty dry camping area before Christmas.  Plenty of room for visitors.  There are 90 full hook-up sites and they were rarely full before October.  There are over 200 dry camping sites and that did not include Trumbo's dry camping area on the other side of Key West.  Our first rotation into dry camping came in late October during Fantasy Fest, but it was for only one night.

We can still see the water across the campground from the Laundry/Wash Facility situated in a central location.  Isn't it beautiful?  It was very hot and humid in early Fall.  High 80s to 90s with 95% humidity, but we did not mind because it was so peaceful.

We were able to pick out our own dry camping spot under the conditions that the area had been opened to campers and no one else had claimed it first.  Oh look, we can still see the Laundry/Wash Facility from here.

Within a week after Christmas, the campground was booming with newcomers.  Often we would walk by the Office to count how many rigs had parked there during the night.  The norm was usually 3 to 4 rigs, but a couple of times their parking lot was full.  One morning, we counted up to 17 rigs.

Later in the day, we would check the Dry Camp list to see how many had actually arrived in one day.  The office posted two lists every day.  The first list contained campsites with full hook-ups and their two week due date for rotation into dry camp.  The second list contained all the dry campers waiting for full hook-ups.  We liked to see how fast we moved up the dry camping list and guess when we would move.  During the busiest time, we were in dry camp for almost six weeks.

We enjoyed the ocean front sites, but the bad weather blowing salty air coated our rig causing problems for our windows, paint, and adding to its rust problem.  Dan spent quite a bit of time working on different problems.

We are basically homebodies.  If it is a choice of dealing with crowds and noise or staying home, we chose staying home.  We did get out once in a while during a few festivities, but usually we enjoyed visiting downtown during the weekday when it was a little quieter. When our son, Shaun came down for a visit, we were happy to show him the sights.  His visit was just in time for several celebrations.

The first one was the Zombie Bike Ride.  We enjoyed watching the parade with over 7000 participants.  A lot of imagination went into some of their costumes and rides.

We stopped to visit with Lexi at Ibis Bay Resort.

Hello!

Of course, we had to take the photo of the Mile 0 and a bonus with the train in the background.

We took Shaun to see Fort Zachary Taylor State Park....

and Hemingway's cats at his house, of course.

We also went to the Pet Masquerade....

is that a Water Witch?

And we spent a little time at the Fantasy Fest

For most of Shaun's visit, we hung out around the base, soaking up the sunshine, and enjoying the views.  So here a few more photos of our winter in Key West, FL.

Boca Chica NAS

C-130 during flying exercise and Squirrel

Dusty telling Dan to rub his belly

We had a nice time, but we have to admit that we were ready to go.  Shopping is limited for locals and many take trips to Marathon or Miami or do without. 

 Of course, being on an island, it is limited on where you can go and it can be very crowded at times.

It was time to say good-bye to Key West.  We are in Spokane, WA visiting with family, getting some shopping done, and getting a few repairs done on the motorhome.  We will stay here two weeks before heading towards the west coast or Bend, OR.  We haven't decided just yet.

Happy Trails!