On the Road to Canada

Washington Pass, North Cascades National Pa

Amazingly I find myself back in the Pacific  Northwest after my motorcycle ride up the coast of Oregon in April of this year. This trip started out with a family gathering in Bedford Wyoming and then on to the Columbia River Gorge. My wife Mary and me had the the Honda Ridgeline loaded with camping gear and picked up her cousin Angus to head up to the North Cascades.  Angus lives just below the Bonneville Dam at  Skamania Landing in the Gorge, where the pictures of barges were taken in April.
     The first day we drove east and north to Lake Chelan, where we camped for two nights. On Wednesday last we cruised the fifty miles up Lake Chelan on the Lady of the Lakes to spend some time in Stehekin. This town and small farming area is only reached by boat or float plane. We got to see the de Havilland Beaver land on the lake while we were touring around Stehekin. There is a visitor center in for the North Cascades Park and we got our first introduction to the North Cascades and picked up a new book by Terry Tempest Williams on the National Parks. It was our first wonderful day on the water.
     Next we packed up our camp on Thursday and drove along the Columbia River and turned northwest up the Methow River. We passed through Winthrop Washington which was having a rhythm and blues festival which we passed up on to see this view in the picture above. It was fun to sit up at this overlook and listen to the motorcycles headed up and down through these turns. I missed the Mothership at this moment. This road looked like a great motorcycle ride.
      On the east side of the pass we came down to the Ross Lake recreation area and this lake with glacial flour coloring the water. It was a beautiful drive through the Park on Washington Highway 20 with high sharp mountain ridges and heavy forests. Though they did almost lose the Park headquarters to fire last year.

Ross Lake

We finished the day eating at the locals favorite fish restaurant in Anacortes  Washington. Great fresh fish and view of the sound at the Secret Cove restaurant. We spent the night in Anacortes because we had a reservation on a ferry to Vancouver Island where we would be entering Canada at Sidney British Columbia.
     Today dawned cloudy and cool, with delightful temperature in the high sixties. But my noon the clouds broke up and we had sunshine and mid seventies for our two hour ferry ride through the San Juan straights past Lopez Island, Shaw Island, Orcas Island and many more we don't even know the name of. In the picture below you can see how calm the water was, and blue sky over it all. It was hard to go inside where the seating was for fear you might miss something going by. At one point they slowed the ferry down for a transit between two Islands that were pretty close together.
     So tonight we are staying in Victoria, but tomorrow we will drive across the island for two nights of camping on the Pacific Coast at Ucluelet
Campground.

San Juan Islands on a ferry to Canada

I promised to give a shout out to Christopher Arthur in Casper Wyoming. Christopher hopes to get home from rehabbing a broken leg which has put a damper on his motorcycle riding season, already short enough in Wyoming. I think the wind quits blowing there two days a year and he may have missed them!!. Get well Christopher.
Will by the Ocean, again.