Alaska Airlines Lounge, SEATAC airport, Washington

 Today turned out to be much more fun than a normal travel day!

Since we are flying overnight to RDU, we had all day to leisurely make our way to the airport.  

Yesterday, we saw that we could hike up to the top of Mt. Erie for some great views....or we could also drive the car to the summit!  We opted for the drive.  Good choice!  We still did a bit of hiking around the summit.  Beautiful views.

 It was about 75 miles to Seattle....so a fairly quick drive down I-5.  We still had plenty of time, so we visited the Chittenden lock park just north of Seattle.

 Lots to see there - very active locks and a fish ladder.

Fun to watch the water/boats lower.

 

 Water lower and boats exiting the lock.

 

 Lock ready for the next group of boats.

 

 We walked across the locks to the fish ladder area.  This one was not quite as photogenic.

 

 They did have a nice underground viewing area.  I believe these are Chinook salmon.

 

 Not too long before another lock with larger vessels filled up.
 

 

Dock workers strapped into safety lines threw lines to the large boats.

Good, free fun.

Then back into the heart of Seattle downtown to return our rental car.  After being in the "back country" for so many days, the city driving was really unnerving.  The tally on the odometer yielded 3,882 miles driven in 35 days!

 

 Then it was back in to the "city" routine.  We walked to the light rail for the 45 min trip back to SEA TAC airport.  (Each of us dragging a suitcase and toting a backpack....so not as easy peasy as I'm implying......but the train is just $3 each.

We quickly found the Alaska Airlines lounge....will be "home" for several hours while we wait on our late flight.  So nice to be able to relax in comfy lounge chairs, free beverages/food and most importantly, quiet!  (Bloody mary was too spicy!!) 

 

Nice view from our seats.  Alaska Airlines is very popular here!   First flight is to Pittsburgh and then on to RDU tomorrow morning.

 

Anacortes, Washington

 Our time in the PNW is really winding down now!  Uneventful ferry reservation for the trip from San Juan Island back to the mainland in the morning.

View from the top deck of the ferry of Friday Harbour.

The ferry was at capacity for cars, but the passenger area is almost empty.

Not sure why they have so much capacity for people and so little for cars....

Heading mostly eastbound, the view in between islands with (I believe) snowy Mt. Baker in the distance.

There were several private boats out sailing.  Beautiful big boat - I only saw one couple on it.

Approaching the destination of Anacortes.

We couldn't check in to the next AirBnB until 3pm so we, of course, took a nice hike.  

Just a few miles out of Anacortes was Whisper Lake with a nice 3.7 mile trail around it.  Perfect for our last hike in the PNW.  Really nicely maintained trails.

Lots of elevation changes....I didn't read the details of this one ahead of time.  I assumed it was a pleasant walk just around the lake at the low lakeside level.

 

But it actually climbed up and down the rolling hills surrounding the lake.  Good for the heart rate!

 

A lovely day and a lovely hike.  So happy we had such wonderful weather for almost all of the 35 days we were here.

 Tomorrow will be a travel day - we'll have to get back to Seattle, turn in the rental car and make our way back via the light rail to the airport.  Our flight back to Raleigh will be overnight tomorrow night so we'll likely be pretty wiped when we get home the next day.

Friday Harbour, San Juan Islands, Washington

 Well, today didn't turn out as I'd planned at all....we planned to hop on the intra-island ferry for the 8:30AM trip over to Orcas Island.  I had an entire day planned of hiking and touring cool spots before jumping back on the 4PM ferry to go back to Friday Harbour.  We went over to the ferry dock and waited, only to eventually be told that the ferry wasn't going to run that route because of some difficulty.  We could come back for the 11AM ferry.  We decided that wouldn't give us enough time to do anything comfortably so we just scrapped the idea.  

There still were a few things we hadn't seen on San Juan Island, so we headed back over to the American Camp area. 

 

 

 We hiked the Mt. Finlayson loop for a little over 3 miles.

 

About 1/2 of the trail was exposed grassland.

The Cattle Point Lighthouse in the distance.

 

About 1/2 of the loop was this lovely forest.  Quiet and cool.

 

We went down to South Beach for a nice beach walk.

 

Some of the kelp had washed ashore.

 

I got a close up of the kelp.  Such a weird other-worldly plant.  I touched some of it - not slimy at all.

 

We had a very nice long walk on the beach - amazingly - not a single piece of trash/plastic/glass was found!

 

Leaving the beach, view back towards the mainland.

 

And the last thing we did was find a lavender farm.  This one lets you "cut your own".....

 

It's lovely - I expected it to smell nicely - but it was pretty odorless.....

 

Oh, happy birthday to Duane!!

Friday Harbour, San Juan Island, Washington

 Today's mission was to explore San Juan Island by driving around the perimeter.  First, we pulled into a state park when we saw the signs (we look for the brown road signs!)  Lovely views.

 

 

And we unknowingly witnessed someones proposal on this rock formation!  I assume by the laughter and her looking at her hand with the ring on...that the answer was yes.

 

Lovely beach there.

 

We drove on north towards Roche Harbor on the north side of the island.  There is a very active grass runway there.  Lots of folks coming/going to the huge marina there.

 

I had read about a "mausoleum" built by a wealthy family about 100 years ago....

 

A little weird...6 family members are buried beneath these concrete chairs with the seat backs being their gravestones...interesting but a bit creepy.  A lovely trail though.

 

And on to the marina - it's huge!  Lots and lots of large power boats/yachts.  Very few sailboats.

 

A real tourist spot with lots of vendors and places to stay.

 

We wandered the dock a bit...and were particularly interested in the seaplane comings/goings.  

 

We sat on a bench in the sunshine and watched several land/taxi.

 

 It was amazing how many big boats were there.

 

 

Our curiosity sated, we took a trail around a historical limestone quarry.  Saw this lovely buck in the shadows.

 

The view to part of the marina from the quarry trail.

 

Next up on the agenda was to tour the "English Camp" of the Pig Wars fame.  A lovely garden and some buildings are left.

 

Continuing our travel around the island, we took a trail to the limestone kiln ruins.  Interesting to read about turning limestone into quicklime by burning the rock for days.  This three story kiln was right next to the water for easy transport at the time.

 

The trail to the lighthouse nearby.  You can see kelp floating in the water.

 

Rather small Lime Kiln lighthouse.

 

Lucky timing, there were rangers there that allowed us to go up the stairs to the top of the light.

 

Looking down from the lighthouse to a kelp field.

 

The day was winding down....on to the American Camp on the other side of the island from the English Camp.  Not much remains of the American Camp as it was not as well funded or supported at the time.

 

On the south side of the island was another small lighthouse - Cattle Point.

 

And a lovely beach nearby with lots of bird activity.

 

And that was about it for the day!  Over 20,000 steps and we saw lots of island history!