Washington Shore

We love to take pictures of flowers and I couldn't resist posting this one.

We left the Mt. Baker area on Friday, September 19 and drove southwest toward the ocean. We crossed onto Fidalgo Island where we went when we took the ferry except that this time we went south down to the tip of the island. It is farming area. At the south tip we crossed over the bridge at Deception Pass. We learned that the water actually “boils” when the tide goes in or out. We could see it when we stopped. The bridge itself was high and beautiful as we crossed onto Whidbey Island. Whidbey Island is the longest of the islands and the second longest in the U.S. We spent some time in Coupeville, enjoyed some delicious clams and cod and explored the shops. We went to the lighthouse at Fort Casey and enjoyed watching the deer eat berries.

We have been going to National Parks and getting passport stamps in our book since 1986. We found out that there is a passport book for lighthouses. Well, we started one of those also and now have three stamps in it.

We drove to the south end of Whidbey Island and at Clinton took the ferry to Mukilteo where we stayed two nights and went to the Mukilteo lighthouse.

It rained most of the time we were in Mukilteo. On Sunday we drove down through Seattle and were glad that they had an HOV lane because there was a Seahawk game and folks were all coming into town. We hunted another lighthouse close to Tacoma at Brown’s Point. We drove through Olympia and saw the capital from a distance. We are lunch at a restaurant called The Rusty Tractor. I couldn’t resist a picture and a special one of a Farm All for my dad.

We had a beautiful drive from there to Ocean Shores. If you look for it on a map you will see that Ocean Shores is way out on a long peninsula. It was a fun place and there was much more to do than we could accomplish. The first morning we took a walk and ended up walking over 3 miles including down to the ocean.

We saw four deer out getting their breakfast. The walk was more than I should have done as my ankle flared up again. We did go to Gray’s Harbor Lighthouse which is in Westport just across the peninsula. BUT we had to drive for 1 ½ hours because there was no ferry across at this time of year. We drove all away around Gray’s Harbor. I talked Bob into stopping at a roadside store for seafood. We went to Brady’s (right across a bridge) and bought some crab, scallops, shrimp, salmon and oysters. We learned that the oysters were grown right there in the ocean water under the bridge. They were the best oysters I have ever had. We had oyster stew two days. We didn’t take a trip on Tuesday and it rained Wednesday, Thursday and part of Friday. I worked on some Christmas projects and will post those pictures in January.

We decided to head to Oregon on Saturday. We stopped at Fort Vancouver National Park before we crossed the Columbia River into Oregon. The river is awesome. And we finally get to mark off Oregon. This is the first that either Bob or I have been in Oregon. We drove quickly through Portland and then headed southeast to Bend. We didn’t study the topography well before we left. We drove up into the mountains and close to Mt. Hood. We were surprised and even more surprised as we viewed the huge deep gorge cut by the Deschutes River. We may try to see more this week. We couldn’t get any pictures on the way.

We are so thankful for safe travel and good health. I am getting stronger each day, but not as fast as I would like. We have been especially remembering our friends in South Asia that are in areas with unrest. We trust in the Lord’s protection each day and pray for each of our friends.

Way Up North

More and more and more of God’s beautiful world.





















We left the Chelan area and drove north and then west following what is called the Cascade Loop Scenic Highway. We left the apple grove valleys and made our first stop at (old west) Winthrop for lunch. It is in the Methow Valley and is entirely done in western frontier era, complete with wooden sidewalks.




We then headed to the section called North Cascades Highway and discovered that it wasn’t until 1972 that the modern road Hwy 20 traversed the North Cascades. We stopped at many places for pictures and I will include some below. The color of Lake Diablo was just astounding.


We finally got to our destination close to Glacier, Washington. And it was true; there is no cell reception or TV. The mountains are too tall. We stayed at a timeshare right off of the highway that goes up to the Mt. Baker ski area. There is only one road up that direction. We journeyed up there one day and saw all of the different mountains and the snow.
We didn’t do much hiking because my ankle is really acting up. We did walk on the trails early each morning. The Nooksack River was right out our patio door and we could not only view it but hear it running at all times.

We did hike for a couple of hours one afternoon on a trail by the Nooksack River.
Coleen’s cousins grew up in Deming, Washington which is only 24 miles from where we stayed. We took a drive through there down to Bellingham, then north to Lynden, by Sumas and back to the resort. We were only 2 miles from Canada. Coleen had been to Deming when she was 12 but did not remember that it is basically all farming areas specifically dairy. They also have berries.

One morning we got up early (4am) to drive to Anacortes and take the car ferry to Friday Harbor.




It is one of the San Juan Islands and has a National Park on it. It really was a fun day. The ferry trip took just over an hour and we spent the day driving around the island (a total of 50 miles). We got our park stamp and also got to see two lighthouses. We had delicious clam chowder at a little restaurant for lunch. We ate dinner at Charlie’s which was immediately after we disembarked at Anacortes before we drove back to the resort. We saw the fog come in and thought we would be driving for 2 hours in the fog. It was actually just a large fog over part of the water not on the land or on the entire harbor.

We played some games, read books and enjoyed the fireplace. We didn’t even get to the pool. I did go to a quilt store in Lynden. We went through the shops in Friday Harbor but didn’t find anything that we really needed. Not hearing the news we will play some catch-up this weekend, especially the outcome of Ike. We have family and friends in the Houston area and are keeping them in our thoughts and prayers.

Lake Chelan, Washington

I am wondering. Do we develop more appreciation with age of all that we are seeing or are we taking more time to observe or have we just not seen what we are seeing now? I have been pondering that question this week.

We had a beautiful drive from Idaho to Lake Chelan, Washington on Friday, September 5.
First we drove through acres and acres of golden wheat fields.


Then we stopped at the Grand Coulee Dam along the way. What a difference from Hoover Dam. It is so much wider (almost a mile). It dams up Lake Roosevelt which is over 150 miles long with 600 miles of shoreline. There were 11 towns flooded when the dam was built.

These are from the Lake side of the dam.














This is the huge Grand Coulee Dam.


We also saw two other dams and learned that there are actually 29 dams on the Columbia River system. We had no idea it was such a sophisticated system.

After the second dam we then drove into “apple country”. The trees are loaded and almost ready for picking. At some of the orchards there were large boxes all stacked up and waiting to be filled. At some others the boxes had already been distributed throughout the orchard.





It was delightful to drive through the country and see field after field, row after row and tree after tree laden with fruit. We were able to see some workers picking, boxes of apples being moved from the orchards and then trucks on the road hauling the apples “to market”. It was fascinating. We also saw vineyards, cherry trees (already picked), peaches and nectarines. We bought a box of peaches for $12 that probably had 70 – 75 peaches. We have been eating them all week. We also bought some pluots. They are a cross between a plum and an apricot. After seeing all this fruit it sure would be something to be here when the trees are in blossom.

The dams on the rivers are the way that the land and trees are irrigated. It is very dry unless watered so everything is irrigated. We stayed in a timeshare on Lake Chelan for the week. This lake is 55 miles long and ranges from ½ mile to 2 miles wide. We rode “The Lady of the Lake II” (a 280 passenger boat) from Chelan to Stehekin, literally from the south end to the north end and back. It is about 4 hours each way and we had about 2 hours in Stehekin. We learned that there are about 80 permanent residents in Stehekin. There are quite a few more during the summer when the North Cascades National Park adds to their staff. This is one of the glaciers in the park and the only one that can be seen from the lake.

We spent a day in Leavenworth which is the closest fully Bavarian town we have seen in the United States. We had a great German lunch, browsed through the shops and took some pictures. This was an unusual formation that we saw beside the river.

Another day Bob was blessed (I say that lovingly) to take the van in again (3rd time) to see if they could find the leak in the floor of the passenger side. Praise the Lord they were able to find something and did a patch. They recommended that we take it to a body shop to have it fixed better. We just have to deal with Chrysler to find out where to take it.

It has been an interesting week with my sciatic pain. My ankle started hurting again and we can’t figure out why. We are now assuming that it is because of the steps in our unit. Instead of regular stairs we have a spiral staircase between the kitchen, living/dining room (up) and our bedroom (down). It is also unique because there is actually a door to the outside from both the upstairs and the down. So what I started doing the last couple of days was going outside and walking up the regular stairs and coming back into our unit that way. It is the only thing that is really different and my ankle is swelling again so we have been icing it. We still manage to walk in the mornings. The nights have been in the mid 50’s but it is in the mid 80’s during the day. It is just ideal weather for us.

We went to a great farmer’s market and got some fresh fruit and vegetables. One day we saw all these sailboats on the lake. We don’t know what they were doing but we enjoyed watching them.

I will stop with a note to let folks know that we do not have phone or internet access next week. We will be in the mountains near Glacier, Washington on the back side of Mt. Baker.

Idaho

Well, we haven’t fallen off the face of the earth; we have just had no cell reception for the last two weeks. We were located in a pocket with no reception no matter what service you had. We were able to check email a few times but only did what was absolutely necessary.

We had a beautiful drive from Montana to this area in the way north panhandle of Idaho. There are many lakes and the area is sparsely populated. I still had a little residual of what I would call dizziness for part of last week. Now I just have the sciatica paid to deal with. The resort is located in a valley on a gold course. We did not play but did play miniature golf one time.

We did some sight seeing a few days. We drove most of the way around Lake Pend Oreille to find another timeshare. We found a special restaurant in Sandpoint recommended by our good friends Ryan & Michelle, Panhandler Pies.

We checked out the shops in Sandpoint but found we liked the Ben Franklin best. The area has been celebrating their 100th anniversary of a couple of the towns. We walked over two miles almost every morning. Coleen read a book, started a new cross-stitch and worked on inputting recipes into her computer program. Bob worked on cross-stitch bookmarks to send to Sri Lanka.

We played lots of Tic and even went to the pool and hot tub. It has been in the 70’s each day but down to 50 at night which has been wonderful weather. Bob went out to cook our steak on the grill one evening, had trouble lighting the grill and it was raining a bit. He looked up and saw the rainbows.

We were not as pleased with the resort accommodations and won’t recommend it to others. The unit is extremely small, even for 2 people. It reminded us of a motel room. We went to a film here at the resort one night called Sacred Journey of the Nez Perce which we really enjoyed and learned a lot about the settling of the area. They also had ice cream sundaes one evening.

It was a good two weeks and we look forward to next week in Washington. We hope to do another 10K walk. We will see how I feel.