This weekend I went camping overnight at San Juan Island. It's right on the U.S. / Canadian border, and the only way to get there is to take a ferry or by plane. It's part of a group of large islands in the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Getting there was an ordeal in itself. I got home from work at 8:30 am on Saturday, and quickly threw my stuff together to catch the 9am ferry to Seattle. As I packed, I searched everywhere and couldn't find my cell phone, which is a critical piece of gear if you are going to a strange new location. I remembered that it was in my shorts, and that Mel had done laundry on Thursday night. Sure enough, I eventually found it in the dryer. Miraculously, it still works. I know for a fact it was on when it went in the washer, because I always leave my phone on. The keypad is a little flaky now, especially the "end" button, but it still seems to be usable.
I finally caught the 10 o'clock ferry to Seatle, and Mel picked me up with my back pack and sleeping bag, and we proceeded to spend the next hour in traffic. The main freeway was backed up going north, so we took a side route, which was also backed up due to an accident. But eventually we got out of traffic and made it up north to Anacortes just in time to catch the next sailing to Friday harbor, the only town on San Juan island. Thankfully this was an express ferry, which means that it was only an hour and five minutes to get there.
Once on the island, our friend who had organized the trip and got there on Friday picked us up at the ferry terminal (we had parked at Anacortes and walked on because it was cheaper and easier). We had just enough time to get to the camp site and set up our tent before it was time to go on a whale watching tour.
The whale watching tour was quite impressive. We defiantly got our moneys worth on this one. We saw a bald eagle in tree on the shore, cormorant nesting, harbor seals sunning themselves and swimming about, a minke whale( its quite rare to spot these), and the star attraction, the Orca whale. Over the course of an hour and a half we saw over 20 whales, some as close as 50 yards away. They were blowing and splashing and jumping out of the water, all to the back drop of the sun setting over the strait. To the south across the strait was the Olympic mountain range in all its glory, with the setting sun reflected across the snow capped peaks, and to the north was San Juan island and several pods of whales frolicking. There are three pods of whales that inhabit the Washington area, and they come to the straits for the salmon runs. We where lucky enough to go at a time when all 3 pods were together. Out on the water with us was a scientific observation team and another tour boat. The other tour boat was so crowed with people that when the whales appeared, the whole boat listed to starboard with people looking over the rails. (Special thanks to livingwilderness on Flickr for the pic).
We had dinner in Friday Harbor, and packed up the next morning and caught the 1045 ferry back to Anacortes. I hope to go there again for a little while longer. Maybe next time I'll do the kayaking tour.
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