Woke up really early to catch the first car-ferry back to the mainland and drive up to Canada to return our van and meet up with Noel and Meghan for a few days. We may not have Internet reception once we cross the border, so it may be a few days before you hear from us again.
wish us luck in not getting harassed by the border patrol because we’re driving a van with a big picture of Bob Marley’s face on it!
updated …
We made it to Vancouver without any trouble from the border patrol. The guy had the usual stern and unamused demeanor, but he said he’s seen the Wicked vans before, and waved us by without any trouble. We met up with Noel and he invited us to his apartment where we met his wonderful new wife Jasna, and her awesome son Colya, who was kind enough to loan us his bedroom for our few nights there. It was really good to see Noel again, it has been years since we last hung out in person. The day we arrived Noel had just received his Canadian Citizenship, so we had a celebratory dinner and life was good.
1. Renting the most awesome little tiny car and driving around San Juan Island. I felt like I was driving a fisher price toy around town. We did a loop around the island and saw the sights which too about eight hours total. What a great trip!
2. Having a cheese picnic at beach spots along our coastal ride, reading boks in the grass and watching for whales off shore. Interesting how you’ll see one or two whale watching boats milling around one spot at first, then you can spot the whales they’re watching, and in the course of about ten minutes two dozen more whale watching boats have circled the wagons. They whale watching tour boats clearly have some constant communication going on.
3. The beautiful weather and restaurant for lunch at the marina restaurant on the north side of the island. We had a lovely spot on their patio in the sun, and ordered some of the most delicious fish tacos I’ve ever had.
4. paying a visit to Mona the Camel. This is the islands’s resident camel, and will happily trot over and give you a camel-kiss in exchange for an apple.
5. Finally having a respectable campfire at our campsite.
1. Getting to the ferry landing expecting a 2 hour wait, and finding out we can get on the next boat in 45 minutes. Later, the view of quiet Friday Harbor on Sam Juan Island as the ferry came into the dock was super exciting.
2. sitting at the crabhouse for grilled salmon and the best view of harbor life, watching sailboats come in.
3. happy hour and appetizers at “The Bluff”, an amazing restaurant we found with a small patch of lawn and Adirondack chairs overlooking the harbor.
4. Going on a whale watching cruise and seeing lots of killer whales swimming, jumping and playing.
5. Ending a great day by stipping in at the “Rumor Mill”, the neighborhood pizza joint where we saw some live jazz and watched the locals dance.
We woke up at our campground and headed to fort townsend where we were to catch our ferry to Whidbey Island and continue our next leg of the journey onward towards the San Juan Islands. We weren’t able to make a reservation for the ferry due to lack of internet connection, so we showed up at the ferry station an hour early with high hopes for making it on the next boat. We were unfortunatey four cars away, so it ended up being a three hour wait.
A car ferry ride later, we made it to our next land-mass and drove on to the town of Coupeville, and in the words of a Coupesville native, GPS doesn’t even know where we are! This is one of the best towns ever…. At least one of the best towns the I/we have ever visited. It is a town with the right light, the perfect amount of shops, the perfect number of people with stories, the perfect number of informational plaques… Just perfect. There is no amount of touristy bs. On a Friday night we had no problem finding a place to call home and several places to call home for a bite and a pint. This is the place I hate to share and love to share. It is like stepping back a few decades in time.
Top 5 of the day:
1. Alyssa’s first car-ferry ride. (the Bob rode the ferry with class)
2. Getting to Coupeville and walking main street shops. Having a glass of wine at Kim’s Cafe at the end of the pier and watching boats dock.
3. Having a cold beer at “Toby’s”, which our hotel lady told us “smells like the boat the fish came off of.”, but turned out to be a comfy, local watering hole.
4. Eating at a recommended restaurant named “Christopher’s” and having the best mussels we’ve ever had…ever…ever.
5. The way the light from the setting sun hits the tiny three blocks of downtown Coupville in just the right way.
1. We may have slept in a parking lot, but we can’t complain because this was out our front door.
2. The barista at our morning coffee shop in Astoria. She was the poster child for happy morning person coffee shop worker. Why is it that everyone that works at a coffee shop is so HAPPY that the sun is up?!? haha. Well, she makes the top 5 because she took the cake and she would make the Guiness book if there were a category for chipper in the morning. Oh, by the way, Astoria is where the Goonies was filmed. 🙂
3. Crossing over the gigantic bridge into Washington and singing “Washington” as a 4 part barbershop quartet with only two of us. We are talented.
4. Finally arriving at the Hoh Rainforest after 8 hours in the car. Seriously. We were so sure we would be there in 3 hours. We got our campsite and headed out on the trail. The Hoh Rainforest is amazing and walking the Moss-ome mall of moss trail felt like stepping back in to pre historic times. BTW, DP is laughing at me right now for typing out Moss-ome (rhymes with awesome). Lol.
5. Not actually going crazy in the 8 hour car ride that was supposed to be 3 hours long.
1. Food truck breakfast. I love food trucks! I want to find a pod of food trucks and bring a futon and a television and move in forever. Or even better, have a food truck in my redwood forest ewok village.
2. Molly’s rainy day car tour of the city.
3. Watching 9,000 naked bicyclists bike past in downtown portland.
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4. Molly’s birthday garhering at Doug Fir. So great to meet Molly’s nearest and dearest! You have
a spectacular array of friends and we were so glad to make party with them all!
5. Late night food truck pod stop for crepes and burritos and wood fired pizza!!
1. Waking up in a real bed and taking a real shower. Our motel room was actually really clean and nice (and did not smell like vomit)
2. Stopping at Bandon, OR and having lunch at Tony’s Crab Shack on the boardwalk. This place had the best smell ever! Like butter and lobster and fresh rolls! I could smell that smell instead of a meal every day and be completely satisfied.
3. Stopping in Eugine,OR and sampling a flight of microbrews on the patio at Ninkasi Brewery. They also has a stellar VW food truck on site serving paninis.
4. Racing up a giant sand dune on the coast, and then running, hopping, falling and rolling all the way down.
…more to come…
And here it is:
5Thank you Portland for the amazing reception! The first person I saw as I walked in to Lindsay’s house warming party was Heather. That was magical! We met loads of great Portlanders and discussed how Portland wins…. Hey, I can’t disagree. Who doesn’t love food trucks and flannel?!?
Molly came by and offered to bring us to the poutine food truck across town for some rock your socks off poutine. For those of you that know not what this Canadian delicacy is, let me discribe. It starts with french fries topped with cheese curds, add some peppercinis and fried onions and smother it all in gravy and there you have it: poutine….we ordered twice.
Singing Feliz Cumpleanos to Molly on the ride home was great too. Happy Birthday Moll!!!
