Hello Everyone,
It’s been a tough couple of weeks for me out here. I spent all of last week in Charleston, West Virginia saying goodbye to my dad and trying my best to sort out his affairs. While he had many health problems over the last few years, his death still came as a surprise. It wasn’t something I was ready for at all. While my dad and I were not super close, I will still miss talking with him and visiting with him. I hope he is in a better place and I’m glad he is no longer suffering from any pain or discomfort. My brother flew in for a few days and we were able to spend time with Judy, my dad’s partner of 33 years, and their two Japanese chins Jake and Charlie. I was also really thankful to have a friend passing through Charleston while I was there who took me out to dinner and helped me talk through a lot of my pain. I had another friend drive out from D.C. for my dad’s memorial service which was really something. I’m very blessed to have so many good friends in this life. Since I last wrote, I also turned 50, a milestone birthday which snuck up on me with everything that was going on. I’m glad I didn’t have any exciting plans for it as they probably would have fallen through. Anyways, I am back in Washington State and I am writing to you today from Bellingham in the far north of the state. I’m still sorting out a lot of things in my head, but I wanted to write about my time leading up to my flight to WV because it will be good for me to write.
When I left you last time I was still in Seattle. The last night I was there I made my way over to the University of Washington to visit my fraternity chapter there. They have a lovely fraternity house just off campus and I was happy to meet some of the brothers there. Their Rush Chair, Gunner, showed me around the house and caught me up on all of the things they’ve been up to recently. He even invited me to stay for dinner, which I took him up on, and I got to meet even more of the guys there. It was fun to make those connections and to have a quick visit with them. From there I spent a little bit of time wandering around the University District and then made my way back to the Fremont neighborhood. I had a beer at the Fremont Brewing Company which had quite a few “fresh hopped” beers on tap which are popular in Washington this month as the hop harvest is in full swing and the state is a major producer. From there I stopped into the House Bar which is a dark and interesting dive bar just up the road. Then I headed back to the Ballard neighborhood to catch some live music at the Sunset Tavern. The band was Hemlock Revival and they played some excellent bluegrass music. It wasn’t a big place, but it was pretty packed and I really enjoyed the show.
Friday was pretty gloomy out, so I spent the morning over by Green Lake cleaning up my van a bit and getting things organized. I had a great big messy pork sandwich from nearby Bongos Café and then hit the road north. I drove up to Marysville because gas up there was at least 50 cents cheaper than it was anywhere else in the area. Then I popped back down to Everett for the night. I took a nice walk around downtown when I arrived and then went to the Irishman Pub to watch the Mariners Game. I left after 12 innings because I wanted to see some music that night, but they did end up winning the game and moving on to the championship series for the first time in almost a quarter century. Just down the street I went to see a show at Tony V’s Garage which was hosting a band playing a hard rock set from the 90s. They were really good and it was an eclectic gathering of people there to watch the show.
I slept in a bit on Saturday and then went for breakfast at the local Sons of Norway (I am really enjoying these Saturday pancake breakfasts!). It was busier than the one I was at the previous week in Poulsbo and it took a while to get my pancakes, but I chatted to the folks I was sharing a table with and had plenty of coffee while I waited. The pancakes were hot and delicious when they finally arrived and I was glad I went. From there I headed to the gym and then to the library for a bit and then hopped on the ferry to Whidbey Island. I ended up in Langley for the night which is a super cute little town on the south end of the island. I enjoyed checking out the little shops that were around and then went to see a movie at the tiny theater there in town. The movie was The Roses which was set in Mendocino, California but sadly filmed in England. I was looking forward to seeing some familiar scenery having just been there a couple of months ago. It was an okay movie but got horribly violent at the end and really lost me. But the theater was nice and the popcorn was cheap and it was nice to be there nonetheless.
The next morning I had another wander around town to take a few photos and then proceeded on to Coupeville, another cute little island town a little further north. The weather cleared a little and I set out to take some photos around town and in nearby Ebey’s Landing National Preserve, the first National Preserve in the country. It was established to protect the historic farmlands from development and to show how the original homesteaders of the island (the Ebeys) had lived a century and a half ago. There were some cool old buildings and the landscape was very nice as well. I also enjoyed the historic Coupeville waterfront and a late lunch at Toby’s, a super popular little pub on the main street. It was a little hectic in there on a Sunday afternoon, but my fish and chips were well worth the wait as they were the best fish and chips that I’ve had in a very long time if not ever. Sitting next to me at the bar were an older gentleman who spent a lot of time working on the island and a young lady that lived there in Coupeville , and we had a really nice conversation while we waited. My belly full of delicious fish, I headed on up to Anacortes on Fidalgo Island, the next island north. I went to the local brewery there to catch the Mariners baseball game before calling it a night.
I spent a little bit of time in Anacortes in the morning and it seemed nice enough, but I had an early ferry to catch out to the San Juan Islands and I was very excited to get there. I decided to take the ferry all the way out to San Juan Island (like Hawaii, San Juan Island is both a specific place and the general name for the archipelago). I went to the furthest west island because you only have to pay for westbound ferries and all of my stops on the way back to Anacortes would be free. I really like Washington State Ferries – they are frequent, comfortable and very reasonably priced. On our way out to San Juan Island we saw some beautiful scenery including majestic Mount Baker hovering above the landscape to the east, but it was a pod of orcas which really stole the show.
Arriving in Friday Harbor, the main town on the island, I took off to the north to begin my exploration. A lot of businesses on the island are closed for the season, but that also meant it was considerably quieter than it is in the middle of the summer. I made my way north to Roche Harbor which was once a company town and a huge producer of quicklime. Some of the lime kilns are still standing but the town has long since been turned into an island resort and a nice one at that. After a long stroll through the historic resort, I headed off into the woods to see the impressive mausoleum of John S. McMillan who had been instrumental in building the lime industry at Roche Harbor. It was quite an impressive structure and reminded me of something out of Lord of the Rings. From there, I dropped down to English Camp, one of two old military camps which make up San Juan Islands National Historical Park. While the 1846 Oregon Treaty established the 49th parallel as the border between the U.S. and Canada, ownership of the islands remained in dispute. Both American and Canadian settlers claimed different parts of the island, and in 1859 an American named Lyman Cutler shot a Canadian pig he claimed was rooting around on his land. This sparked off the 12 year long Pig War which was a bloodless affair but it sure dragged on. Finally in 1872 they sought an arbitrator in Germany’s Kaiser Wilhlem who determined that it was, in fact, part of the United States. There are definitely some interesting little stories everywhere you go. From there, I visited the beaches at Lime Kiln State Park, took a stroll around the American Camp, the other side of the historic park, and ended up at Cattle Point Lighthouse for sunset. I cruised back into Friday Harbor for some dinner and a couple of beers and was just about to settle in for the night when I got the news of my father’s passing. It certainly came as quite a shock. There wasn’t really much that I could do from that far away in the middle of the night, but offer my condolences to his partner, Judy, and wish her all the best with the night ahead. Having been on the other side of that with my uncle just a few months ago, I knew what that entailed and thankfully, like my uncle, my dad had made his funeral arrangements in advance so there was someone to call.
I knew that I had to make my way back to West Virginia, but I also knew that it wasn’t urgent to get there immediately. I could think a bit and come up with a plan and go from there.
As you can imagine, I didn’t sleep very well that night, but I was grateful for what sleep I got. I decided to stay in Friday Harbor the next day and make my arrangements to head east. After speaking with the funeral home, they told me it would take several days for them to proceed with the cremation so it might be better to hold off for a couple of days before I came anyway. It might sound terrible that I didn’t rush off immediately, but there was nothing I could do for my dad at that point and it’s been a pretty traumatic year for me all around. I knew what lay ahead so I thought it best to take a couple of days to mourn in my own way, in quiet, beautiful surroundings there in the San Juan Islands. I made my flight reservations and found a good, safe parking place for my van near the airport. I made a lot of phone calls, but I also sat by the water and listened to the birds.
On Wednesday I headed over to Orcas Island and spent some time in Obstruction Pass and Mt Moran State Parks. I had a coffee at the Olga Store which had been featured on the back of Emmylou Harris’s album Roses in the Snow. I hiked to some calming waterfalls and watched a beautiful sunset from the tranquil town of Eastsound. While I had a lot on my mind, it was a beautiful and healing day.
The next morning I moved on to Lopez Island, a quiet little place with about 2500 permanent residents. There was hardly anyone around as I walked out to the end of Spencer Spit, sat and watched the otters play at Watmough Bay and strolled along the coast at Shark Reef Sanctuary. It was at Shark Reef that I spent the most time. When I got to the beach there was a lone seal swimming around and eating and I watched it for a good twenty minutes. Then I came up over a rise and saw a dozen seals just chilling on the rocks with a bald eagle on a branch behind them and the Olympic Mountains as a backdrop. It was pretty spectacular to see and I sat there watching this scene play out for almost an hour. I headed back to the village of Lopez in time to have a beer at the little brewery there and then had an amazing dinner at The Galley, a restaurant with a long history on the island. The current owner/chef makes an amazing bowl of ramen and the bartender, Marina, was a real treat as well. I hung out there for a while and it was nice to be around some people again after a quiet couple of days by myself.
I spent a decent chunk of Friday morning wandering around Lopez as well. I really enjoyed their little history museum and talking with the lady that worked there about her experiences growing up on the island. They had a really nice exhibit on the restaurants which have been on Lopez over the years and since it is such a small place it was pretty comprehensive. It was interesting to see how things had evolved over the years and what had come and gone. Even though it was small and quiet, I really enjoyed Lopez and I felt much more together and at peace when I got on the ferry back to Anacortes. I was happy to have plans that afternoon with my friend Ally who had come on a tour with me in Alaska in 2024. We went out for a nice little kayak adventure around the kelp beds and then she took me to a delicious Italian restaurant in town called Nonna Luisa. It was nice to spend time with her and a big hug went a long way in that moment.
I spent the night in Anacortes and then headed back to Seattle on Saturday. I went to the local Penn State bar to watch the football game and then headed to my parking spot and on to the airport to catch the redeye back to West Virginia. It was a long flight and I didn’t get much sleep, but it wasn’t too bad. I connected in Charlotte and just made my connection to fly the last 40 minutes into Charleston.
My week in Charleston was busy, going through my dad’s things and trying to sort out his estate. He didn’t really have much of anything which made it relatively easy, but there was still a lot of paperwork to go through and a lot of phone calls to make. We had his memorial service on Thursday and I was really happy that about 20 people turned up for it. We really didn’t know if anyone would be there, so it was nice to give him a proper send-off and to share some of my memories of my dad with his friends. We went out for a nice dinner afterwards at one of my dad’s favorite restaurants and it was nice to sit around and enjoy each other’s company.
I flew back to Seattle on Monday, and will write about what I’ve been up to since I got back next week, but I’m going to finish this post up and send it out. I’m going to be here in Bellingham for a few more days and then I’m looking forward to heading towards Eastern Washington this week. It’s starting to snow up in the mountains, and I want to get up and through before the roads close for the winter. I will try and write again next week and let you know what I get into. I hope you’ll come back to see what I’ve been up to. Thank you, as always, for reading and a special thank you to all of you who took the time to comment and message me in the last two weeks. It meant a lot to me.
-Mike