On Saturday, Hubby and I took a drive from our home in Everett, over to the East Side of Lake Washington, and up to the town of Snoqualmie, via Fall City. In July, the Snoqualmie River there is about three feet deep and pretty slow-moving. The kids put their inner-tubes in the water upstream, and just leisurely float downstream. It was a cool, gray day, but they were making the most of it.
It’s pretty hard to believe that, just a short distance upstream, you find this:
In a normal year, the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival takes place during the entire month of April. Washington State’s Skagit Valley is the world’s second largest producer of tulips and bulbs, outside of The Netherlands. There are a couple of large growers who open their fields for the festival; they charge for parking across the street, and tourists are allowed to walk between the rows of flowers, taking pictures and just admiring the beautiful colors of the flowers. They also sell bulbs, cut flowers, and other festival merchandise (there is a new t-shirt design by a local artist each year, and they get to be collectors’ items).
This year of 2020, the Festival was cancelled, due to the State Shelter-in-Place Order to stop the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus. And to make doubly sure that no one got in their cars and drove up anyway, the farmers (probably directed by Festival officials) turned off the “Tulip Cams” that show how the fields are doing, so people can see the flowers at their best full bloom. Double-whammy for all those who look forward to a trip to see the flowers.
Hubby and I go most years, and I try to get new photos each year. So here are many of the photos I have taken in previous years. I hope you enjoy them.
2015
2017
Tulip Fields near Mount Vernon, WA
The farmers in the Skagit also grow daffodils, and they bloom before the tulips.
Skagit Daffodils
2019 was an exceptional year for the tulips.
It’s a crying shame that the state government dictated that the tulip-growers of the Skagit Valley were unable to sell their crop this year. So unnecessary, and so depressing for those of us who need those brightly-colored flowers to show us that Spring has arrived. We fervently hope that the growers will be back next year.
For all you Ricochet members who are planning to go to the SD Meetup in September, I thought I’d do a little post with some of the photos I took when we visited on our way to Hillsdale Hostel in 2010. We didn’t visit all the places Randy has found, but we did catch a few. One place we visited then, that nobody knows about or wants to visit this year, is the Music Museum at the University of South Dakota in the town of Vermilion. Get out your map, and try to find Vermilion. You haven’t seen “off the beaten path” until you have been there.
Anyway, here are pictures of some of the places on Randy’s list.
Devil’s Tower National Monument, Wyoming
That’s Devil’s Tower National Monument. We spent half a day there, and walked the entire trail around the base.
Obviously, Mount Rushmore. And for you geology buffs, on the back side of Rushmore:
I was fascinated by the layers of this rock, and their out-of-kilter appearance. The power of Nature.
This is only a small taste of the aircraft found at the Air and Space Museum.
Spring. The first sign is the gradually, gradually, lengthening days. Still awaking in the dark, but driving home from work in daylight. Here in the Pacific Northwest, Spring is normally pretty rainy (yeah, the cliche about April showers bringing May flowers that we all know and love). But we actually love the rain here, because that means Mother Nature waters our yards instead of us doing it.
Our Japanese Maple trees leaf out, and the grasses are green again. The rain fills the bird-bath, and sometimes our resident squirrel comes in for a drink.
On my drive to work in the morning, I travel the roads on the perimeter of Paine Field, the Snohomish County Airport. There are five of these flowering cherry trees, which are actually pretty old. This year, the flowers were so heavy, the branches were dipping almost to the ground.
This year, to spite the Government lockdown, I got in the car and drove up to the Skagit Valley in March to take a look at the tulip fields. It was too early for tulips, but the blueberry vines were just about to start budding.
Last year, the tulips were in full bloom in April. It’s a wonder, being able to get out of your car, and walk through the fields of brightly-colored flowers. Tiptoe through the Tulips, indeed!
A bit farther west of the tulip fields is the town of LaConner, on the Swinomish Slough. Salmon swim up the channel, and local sculptors have captured some.
And Life flows on, within you and without you… George Harrison
A surprise is something unexpected, exciting, thrilling.
On our Hillsdale College cruise to Hawaii in 2018, we had a few hours in Kona on the Big Island of Hawaii. We were taking a rest in a pleasant little shopping center, deciding where to go next, when I happened to glance at a tree behind me, and saw the big snail. I got out my camera to take his picture, when I noticed, on the opposite side of his tree, a little green lizard! I never would have noticed him if I hadn’t been zooming in on the snail. And I’m pretty sure neither knew the other was there!
I also got a big kick out of this sign we saw in a coffee shop right by the dock where the cruise ship’s boat let us off. How many places do you know where kids who misbehave are offered this?
Mongoose? Someone at that coffee-shop has a great sense of humor.
I have not had nearly enough opportunity these days to get outside with my camera. So I thought I’d go back to the archive and find some of the photos that I’m fondest of. Here are some.
Potholes Reservoir, Eastern Washington-site of ancient flood
For some reason, this photo of the Potholes Reservoir has been the most popular photo I have ever posted on my blog. In my stats, list of “views”, this one comes up the most often. I remember taking this, when I stopped there on my way to the Tri-Cities for a Pacific Northwest Purchasing Conference. I went by myself, and gave myself enough time for stops whenever I found something picturesque.
Thirteen Common Bushtits on our Suet Feeder, January 2012
In the “lucky break” category, I was fortunate to capture this one, out my back door during a snowy period, which is fairly rare around here. Bushtits normally travel in flocks, and they just loved that suet.
I have always loved this one, which captures the natural beauty of Puget Sound. It was taken from the deck of a Washington State Ferry on our way back from Kingston on the Kitsap Peninsula. I always thought that Mount Rainier looked like it was floating in the sky.
Leafy glade with bench, Seattle Japanese Garden
The Seattle Japanese Garden is nearly 100 years old now, and extremely popular all year round. It is very peaceful, with lots of nice benches where visitors can sit and contemplate the trees and shadows. So many different shades of green!
Cliff, with signs of an arch forming. Zion National Park, Utah.
Just spectacular rock formations at Zion National Park.
A bunch of different kinds of barrel cactus.
I was actually surprised by how much I enjoyed the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix. Some of the cacti they have there look almost sinister, like they could break formation and attack you.
Sunset above the clouds
This one speaks for itself.
I learned recently that Rush Limbaugh’s favorite bird is the pelican, so I immediately sent him this one that I took in 2018 in San Francisco Bay from the deck of the Crystal Symphony cruise ship. Flying in a perfect “V” formation!
Boats at Marina, Victoria
Taken at 7AM on a Sunday morning, with the calm water, and the boats at the marina inVictoria, BC, Canada. No two boats are alike.
Kilauea Volcano in Hawaii, when it was erupting. We spent an hour off the coast of the Island of Hawaii, watching and listening as the lava flowed into the Pacific. Real Fire and Brimstone-the power of Nature.
Walls of Garden
Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island. You can lose yourself in there. We first went there on our honeymoon in 2003, and we try to go back as often as we can.
I think the July 4 Holiday weekend will be a good time to get out and drive around our beautiful Pacific Northwest.
In this very noisy world, where you are always surrounded by man-made sounds, it can take a long search to find a really quiet place. It also depends on how you define “quiet”. Can a quiet place have people in it, or do you have to be alone to have quiet? Can you be indoors, or must you be outdoors? As my friend Hank Barr says, the answer to nearly any question is, “It depends”. It’s my opinion that the reason 20th Century music can be discordant or atonal is due in part to the increasing noise in the man-made environment, including automobiles, machinery, and recordings that can be played at ear-splitting volume. Horse-drawn wagons and carriages didn’t make much noise, but that big cement truck sure makes a lot of noise!
Back in October of 2012, Hubby and I traveled to the East Coast, and we got to spend part of a day on the beach at Cape May, New Jersey. Cape May is a big tourist destination, and during the summer months the beaches are crowded with throngs of vacationers taking up every square foot of sand. In October, however, all the crowds have gone, the streets are empty (you can even find a parking place on the street!), and the beach is empty of swimmers and sunbathers. We were fortunate to get excellent weather, too, with sunny skies and temperatures in the 70s. It felt really weird to have the broad expanse of beach almost entirely to ourselves.
It was almost eerily quiet, except for the sound of the Atlantic Ocean waves breaking. The constant sound of ocean waves is very calming, and contributes to the sense of quiet.
Now, the beach wasn’t entirely empty. We did have some avian company.
Birds, Cape May, NJ
We enjoyed watching the mixed flock of Skimmers, Terns, and Gulls.
Back from the beach, behind the dunes, is a quiet pond, with swans and ducks swimming. Here’s a trio of Shoveler Ducks, one in a most undignified position.
Cape May is a very popular vacation destination. On the East Coast, there is a tradition of people taking vacation lodgings for the summer season, and the town is filled with big houses where dozens of families rent for weeks or the whole summer. In October, those houses were mostly empty and quiet.
The street was lined with these big, beautiful houses, which just had to be vacation rentals. You could imagine the sounds of summer, with children running around and calling to each other, and cars going by. But at this time, it was almost eerily quiet.
It’s almost hard to believe that this vacation destination could actually ever be this subdued, but with the people gone back to their cities, it’s a nice place to visit for some peace and quiet. We were very lucky that we went when we did. A few days later, Superstorm Sandy hit, and this beach wasn’t quite so peaceful or quiet.
Can you watch this, and not know that Nature is more powerful than you are? This is a source of the inexpensive hydro-electric power that we in the Pacific Northwest rely on. That river flows day and night, summer and winter, with no interruptions. Flow is heavier when fed by Spring runoff when mountain snow melts. This is Snoqualmie Falls in Spring. Listen to the Power.
When I see a road, I usually wonder where it leads. On our travels in the Pacific Northwest, Hubby and I pass many freeway turnoffs with roads down which we have never traveled. On the way to Mount Vernon, there is a freeway exit marked “Starbird Road”, and I have always been intrigued by the name. We took the exit once, and it basically led nowhere. All that was distinctive about it was the name. Oh, well..
This road is in Eastern Washington, on the banks of the Columbia River. Winding? Certainly! And fun to drive, too.
Winding Road-Eastern Washington State
I have always loved the “shrub-steppe” terrain in East-Central Washington. even when the hills are brown, they are beautiful to me, and the roads are laid out to follow the “lay” of the land, not just up and over.
Closer to home, right across the street from the biggest factory building in the world, is the Narbeck Wetland park. Trails through the park wind among marshes and a tiny island. There are sights to see in any season (just wear your boots in the fall and winter when the paths can get muddy). I especially like the boardwalk.
Roads are not always on land. Off the coast of Washington State are the Marine Highways of the Gulf Islands of British Columbia. The BC Ferries ply the “sea lanes”, connecting passengers with the various islands. When we drive up to Victoria, BC, we love to take the big car ferries. The picture below was taken from the deck of a similar ferry. The captains toot their horns when passing each other.
BC Ferry, making its way through the Gulf Islands
There are big islands, like Salt Spring Island, and Vancouver Island (where Victoria is), and there are many tinier islands, some uninhabited, and some even privately-owned.
The Olympic Peninsula of Washington is one of the loveliest places in the state. Many years ago, I had a boyfriend who lived in Port Angeles, so I went there (by car, and Washington State Ferry) often. We would often go to the Dungeness Spit National Wildlife Refuge. We know where this path leads…
The path down to the Spit (down a steep path from the wooded bluffs above) is lined with tall evergreen trees, Douglas Fir, Hemlock, and Spruce. The Spit is five miles long, and at its far end is a lighthouse. You can walk the entire length, which is much more difficult than it looks, since it’s all on sand. When you reach the end, you know you’ve been getting your exercise! Itself, it is a long, crooked road.
[Author’s note: this post will contain no social commentary (seen elsewhere on this blog) nor virtue signaling] Just the link to Tina’s original post.
