Hello! We are excited to be back on the road for another family bike vacation in Washington State. This year we have a tandem for Daisy and A and a bike + WeeHoo for H and I. We were close to having a dual tandem trip but someone started the summer by breaking their arm! More later…
This is our last day on the bikes for this trip. We’ve had an awesome trip and are sad to see it come to an end. We went out with a bang, though, with some very, very steep hills and a total of 1400 feet of climbing. Our legs are much stronger than when we started a couple weeks ago!
The morning started with a strong, chilly wind. Daisy cooked breakfast and we let the kids eat their pancakes in the tent. This is a luxury we would not allow if we were camping in bear country. Everyone slept pretty well, except the small slant of the campsite meant everyone was sliding to the bottom of the sleeping pads, ha. (It doesn’t take much slant to slide when you are wearing ruu-muus.) As Daisy started washing the dishes after breakfast, the wind kept blowing them away off the picnic table! I was called over to assist by drying and putting them away before they could fly. Our new kayaker friends were heading out this morning, and I hope they were going with the wind!
We decided to head south out of the park, and finish a loop around the island. The first hill was a brutal way to ‘warm up.’ The west side of San Juan Island is relatively rugged, while the center and east is flat and rolling farmland. In any case, we made it over the hill and stopped at Lime Kiln State Park. There aren’t any campsites here, but there is an old lighthouse with a whale watching/observation station. There were two researchers inside the lighthouse and they were playing live the sound recorded by a hydrophone in the water. They count the sightings of Orcas, both resident and transient, as well as other whales. Before we left the park, we bought an early lunch at a food stand, a bagel (for A) and hot dogs (for H and me). I’ll have to ask my friend Derek, from Chicago, if Cheetos and tuna are acceptable toppings for hot dogs, in addition to ketchup. H seemed to think so!
The next section of riding was the most beautiful of the trip, and somehow we didn’t stop to take a picture. The road wound along the edge of a hill/cliff over the ocean. The shoulder was lined by wildflowers and blackberry bushes. Beautiful.
We made good time across the island, and even had a tail wind for a short section. We got into town and were trying to decide what we should do when I realized that a ferry going directly to Lopez (35 minutes of travel, instead of 1:30) was leaving in ten minutes! We walked our bikes the two blocks around the corner and right onto the ferry. Yay. That meant that we arrived on Lopez around 2:40 instead of 5-something, and that dinner and the evening routine would go much better.
The ride on Lopez was uneventful and familiar. We made it up from the ferry dock without issue. H didn’t even fall asleep! Once we got back to the cabin, we just started to get packed up. The Wee Hoos can fit entirely in the roof ‘rocket box’ (when broken down a little) with a little room to spare for helmets and other accessories. The bags got tossed into our “Adventure Prius” and the cabin cleaned out of everything but what Daisy needed for the next couple days and the airplane trip back. The car got packed, but not over packed, and was ready for the 1400 mi drive back to CO. I enjoyed one more day with everyone on Lopez before making the drive, and will pick up Daisy plus kids at the airport tomorrow. We’ll post again for our next mini-adventure on bikes. Until then, take care!
Today we had a great day. Lots of adventures, and also the hardest day of riding so far with about 1100 feet of climbing. There were some very steep hills!
After breakfast and packing up camp we started our day off with a visit to the field of outdoor games. I taught the kids checkers (A seemed to get it, but H didn’t have enough interest to sustain the full game). They also enjoyed horseshoes, but Daisy had to keep stopping them from walking in front of each other when they were about to throw the shoe. I borrowed a full-sized pump and added air to all of the tires. It was sorely needed! Most of the tires were at around 20 psi. We were being careful to not over-inflate, and had them left alone, forgotten, but this was clearly a problem. We made a mental note to add a pressure gauge to our fix-it kit so we wouldn’t have to worry about this again. The little travel hand pumps never have gauges.
We eventually tore the kids away from the games for a snack and got on the road. I believe they’d have been content to keep playing all day. We didn’t go directly to our destination, but took a detour to Roche Harbor. This is a small private resort. We arrived by way of a steep hill, which could have been avoided by not following the sign that points the way for cars. That route did give us a great view of the harbor though!
Roche Harbor is a cute little vacation spot with stores (groceries and souvenirs), restaurants, a large marina, and some historic kilns. Oh and the public bathrooms were impressive, with each individual one being clean, tiled, and containing a shower. We got lunch (and coffee for Daisy) and it was well received by the kids. Daisy also played freeze tag with the kids in a little patch of grass that had a sign saying “no dogs allowed, kids play here.”
We got on our way again, and decided not to stop at English Camp (National Historic Park) which was a good decision because it gave us more time to enjoy San Juan County Park and also made sure that we got a campsite (first come first served). The last section of riding had some very steep hills and of course H fell asleep. We stopped in a driveway to adjust her head/posture and that is when the traffic began.
We had never seen so much traffic on the island! (Except when the ferry let off the cars of course.) All of a sudden there was a mail truck, a large delivery truck, and a car that all wanted to go in the small driveway we stopped at. A teenage girl was sent out to ask us not to stop in the driveway because her “dad has a lot of deliveries, so he doesn’t like cyclists stopping here.” No problem, we were happy to move on. (We felt bad for the girl, who must do this a lot, and to people that then never pass by the driveway again.) We stopped in the next driveway down to finalize H’s head re-adjustment and fish out a few M&M’s only to be bombarded by more traffic. This driveway looked like it went back to multiple houses and we moved aside as three vehicles entered. It was 2:30 PM, what was happening?! Whatever. We were done and nearly to the park so we just got on our way.
We rolled into the park and decided to pay a few dollars more to get our own site instead of squeezing into the hiker/biker/kayaker group site. Our site was next to the h/b/k site though so we still got to check out all the adventurers. We dropped off our bikes and walked down to beach to explore. Nearly every rock we checked had little crabs underneath. There were plenty of interesting pebbles and other treasures to look at, too. After awhile we headed back to the campsite. Daisy started cooking dinner and I got the kids set up to fly kites. It was a beautiful spot, on a field above the water looking across the strait to Canada (Vancouver Island). After dinner we took a walk around the campground. There is a cabin from about 1900 that is the only original homestead on public land on the island. Also, we found, and ate, some blackberries along the road. I put my long arms to good use. Yum.
We enjoyed chatting with a couple who kayaked into the park from Friday Harbor (over two days) while the kids got the tent set up for “a party.” We extracted them from their game in time to arrive at the water’s edge for the sunset, which was 5(+) stars.
This morning we woke up a little earlier than usual so that we could be sure to catch the 10 o’clock inter-island ferry. Daisy got out of the tent to work on breakfast while I moved A and H onto the same sleeping pad and put away as many items from the tent as I could. They continued sleeping without noticing.
I woke A and H with promises of chocolate chip pancakes, which got them moving enough. They went out to start eating with Daisy while I broke down the tent. Luckily they weren’t hungry enough to eat my pancakes, too! Once breakfast was over, Daisy took the kids to a playground and I did cleanup and finished packing up the bikes. By a little after 9 we were heading out on the road.
Our route took us along different roads than I’ve traveled before. There was one especially pretty spot with some houses lined up along a small bay. Since our bikes are still much lighter than when we started a couple weeks ago, the five miles to the ferry didn’t take long and we were at the ferry lot with plenty of time to spare. There is something very satisfying about seeing a long line of cars, but getting to go all the way up to the front since walkers and bikers are guaranteed a spot on the ferry. We waited for the ferry to come, unload, and then got on with the other cyclists and walkers.
The inter-island ferry stops at Shaw and then Orcas Island before arriving at Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. A especially enjoyed watching us dock and the cars getting on and off at each spot. It was about an hour and a half boat ride. I enjoyed looking out at the shoreline as we passed.
In Friday Harbor we bought lunch at the downtown grocery store and the ate it at an overlook above the harbor. We then went next door to the Whale Museum. H is still too young for most of the displays, but we did talk about Orcas and watched a video. The Orca population has declined significantly due to shipping noise Navy sonar, and overfishing of salmon. Daisy took A around, and eventually they sat down to read a few books in the kid area while I took a quick look around by myself.
There was one book that caused a stir, called Springer’s Journey. It is about a young Orca whose mother died and who then got lost and tired and hungry. Eventually humans put her in a pen, helped her get healthy again, and brought her back north to reunite with her family pod. This sad story made both A and H cry. But then H demanded to read it again and again! (Crying every time.) It was clear that the book touched them profoundly.
On our way out of town we picked up groceries from the big grocery store. The road north had rolling hills and passed along farm and forest. Of course H feel asleep and we stopped in a driveway to try to keep her head upright. (We would need a long term solution if this bike tour was going to be much longer.) While Daisy did her magic with various pieces of clothing, and the two orca whale stuffies we had added to our collection that served as pillows, Alice enjoyed watching five kids that were jumping off a dock into a pond over and over again.
We rolled into Lakedale late in the afternoon to find a table with our name on an envelope, and headed to our campsite assignment. It was site 200, (they are not labeled sequentially,) and we were disappointed to see it. The was no grass, no tent pad, and no clear site to put a tent at all. There was only hard packed dirt like a driveway. After a few minutes of our kids shuffling around kicking up puffs of dirt, Daisy sent me back to find out what other site could be available. For the ridiculous sum of money we were paying for this site, we expected at least a minimum level of comfort! At the lodge I found someone able to assign me to a different site (apparently the only other one available) which we switched to. We were happy to see there was a small amount of grass (although large roots went through it, I’m glad the kids didn’t trip more than once) and a clear spot for a tent. It was acceptable. It was also a plus that the site was slightly further from the group playing loud music. Ah, yes, all of this combined reminded Daisy and I why we dislike private campgrounds.
We had a good dinner and then took our traditional walk through the campground to look at other sites, tents, and vehicles. We spent a few minutes at the field near the lodge, where there were outdoor games. I attempted to teach the kids ping pong (they need a bit more hand-eye coordination), they played with a large connect-4 set, and they built a tower with oversized Jenga blocks. It was then that I realized that the price of this campground was due to the associated amenities. (I’m also sure it helps them that there aren’t any other campgrounds nearby.) These amenities did make for a fun and eventful morning the next day.
Oh, and by the way, A and H have have been demanding that we tell them (made up) stories about flying doggies that protect the environment and save animals every night before sleep.