Reflections on the Islands

We are nearing our end of Washington and I realized I haven't even posted on our last adventures. The weekend after labor day we went to the San Juan Islands to camp and explore. This was the weekend following our epic National Parks trip so camping wasn't exactly the thing I wanted to do but we had reserved our spot months in advance.  The San Juan Islands are to Washington as the Outer banks are to North Carolina except you can't cross a bridge to the San Juans. We had been warned that in the summer the ferries to the islands become backed up and  to prepare for hours of wait time but since we were going after what NC considers the end of summer weekend we thought we'd be ok. When we got to the ferry terminal we were greeted with our ferry tickets for the 7:20 PM departure time...and it was 3:45 PM. So we did the only natural thing to do while waiting for a ferry, that is drink beer in the car. Actually we only split one beer between the two of us, ate some snacks from the cooler, took a walk, talked to other ferry goers, and sat in the car. Once on the ferry we realized it was going to be a beautiful ferry ride as the sun was setting across the islands. A thin fog hung like spider webs just hovering over the water that pictures could never do justice.

Bad thing about going over at night...setting up the tent in the dark. Amazingly enough the campground was the darkest campground we had camped at all summer and the most private.  No threat of bears on the island. It was funny to walk by our neighbor camper's site to see cooler and cooking pots out on picnic tables with no one to be seen. That would have never happened out in bear country unless you liked unwanted large furry visitors. Our orignal plan was to explore all the Islands on Saturday but after our ferry wait the day before we vetoed getting on another ferry. We were actually staying on Orcas Island.

Instead we took the day to eat seafood, look at pottery, go in a for real tree house, and drink beer at the local island brewery. We also picked up a hitch hiker just outside the campground. Jonathan had been talking about wanting to pick up a hitch hiker all summer and we had never gotten the chance. Jonathan reads a lot of books on through hikers who rely on rides from strangers to get into town to gather supplies. The guy we picked up was a recently graduated college student who was there for the summer working at one of the resort houses.

   It was at the local brewery where met up with a group of our age similarly minded campers who just happened to be camping in our campground. We shared our picnic table with them at the brewery and they shared their camp fire later that night. They had 11 people in their group all in one campsite. Since we had gotten a shhing from some other campers and drinking games were beginning we decided to play silent flip cup. When that fun ended we decided to walk to the 'beach' which was a small lake on the other side of the road. Its not far from the campsite, you can even see it in the daytime but it was a dark night. While walking there we came to a ridge where we could see sand. Now since the northwest lakes and rivers have clear water it was difficult to decide in the dark if the sand was from a shore or if it was the water. One camper decided to check it out by jumping down into it and it was indeed water. A good laugh for all involved. We should have know better since there really are no 'sandy' beaches here. Walking a little further we came to a spot were we could wade out into the water. Someone had the idea to go skinny dipping but since it was so cold this really just involved taking off your pants and walking in ankle deep water. Moral of the story never turn down camping with strangers. After all strangers are just friends you haven't met yet right?

The second time we went out to the islands was when Jonathan's parents came up to see us in early October and we went whale watching off the coast of the San Jaun Islands. Whale watching and boat tours are both gambles in Washington especially in October when the weather becomes incessantly cloudy and misty. Luckily though we got a perfect day, sunny and clear. We had views of Mount Baker all day long. We also got views of whales. A pod of orca whales were feeding on a sea lion as they were spotted by the boat captain. They did all the things you see at Sea World. They flipped out of the water, slapped their tails, and came right up to the boat so we could see!