Two small cities have proved to be very neat this past week. Anacortes was our first stop after leaving the North Cascades.
It sits on the northern tip of Fidalgo Island, one of the dozens of islands in the San Juan Island group northwest of Seattle. In the summer, this is a jumping tourist town and it is heavily geared to that trade with an old town that is dense with gift and craft stores. It’s a gorgeous setting. We zipped up to an overlook where you can see about 270 degrees both into the town
and, by turning around, across Padilla Bay to the coast whence we just came.
By the way, we’re holding our breath on the weather. We’ve been very lucky almost throughout this trip, as the jet stream has been sending everything either far north or far south of wherever we have happened to be.
We got in a little after noon, so we scooted down into town for some lunch. And what better place than . . . surprise, a brewpub! Like the ones in Portland, this was excellent. It was the Rockfish Brewpub, with the Anacortes brewery immediately adjacent through glass windows in the wall. We not only had superb calamari and halibut tacos, but I think I’ve found my alltime favorite beer.
It’s the nearer one, not that it makes much difference in the pic. A special brew that they do very seldom, because of the cost of the hops. Previously, I thought Dogfish Head 6 Hour was my favorite (out of Baltimore), but this one blew me away. An Imperial Special IPA, about 8% ABV. What an incredible mouthfeel: lush, creamy, lip-smacking; with a beautiful balance of heavy hops and just the right amount of malt to round it off. Oh, nurse. They only sold it in schooners, which are about ten ounces, but it was so rich that I didn’t care. Unfortunately, it’s not available in bottles; I’d buy a case in a heartbeat.
We worked off the lunch by staggering from shop to shop. There’s some pretty high-end stuff going on here, and well worth the browsing. We met one guy who was the third generation owner of the family jewelry and gift business. If we had had any room left in Albatross, we would have hauled away a few more items. Instead, we picked up some local conversation and found that it was homecoming for the local high school, and the parade was about to begin down the main drag. Sure enough, without any barriers or street closures, on came the band, the drum majors (?), the king and queen, and the float, as in singular. We love small towns.
After the parade passed, everything went back to sleep, so we took a trip around the island to see Deception Pass. We first went through Washington Park, which lies out on the western point of the island, and has a nice windy, small road encircling it. We then made for the pass and it’s nifty and h-i-g-h bridge.
Besides being a source of confusion for old Vancouver, this narrow pass has very rapid tidal flow, and it is local sport to watch from the bridge as boats try to make their way in or out in the swift current. Or so they say. Sounds like watching paint dry to me. Unless of course they hit a rock. No one was going anywhere while we were there, so we headed back to our spot at the Pioneer Trail RV Park, a very pleasant place with huge pine trees, but only one bath house, situated a long, cold shuffle from the rig.
Our second neat town is Port Townsend, which also sits at the top, this time of the Quimper Peninsula, directly west of Whidbey Island. All of this is north of Seattle, more opposite Everett. I’m jumping to this town, although we actually made a couple of intermediate stops on the mainland, which I’ll get to in the next post. You get to it partially by crossing a “floating” bridge that connects the Olympic and Kitsap Peninsulas. At 7,869 feet (2,398 m) long, it is the longest floating bridge in the world located in a saltwater tidal basin, and the third longest floating bridge overall. Most bridges go up; this one goes down.
Port Townsend, unlike the faux facade villages of Leavenworth and Winthrop, is a genuine Victorian village, built in the late 1800’s and largely preserved in the old section as it appeared then. It also is a one-main-street affair, lying right on the bay. We found the Point Hudson Marina & Resort there, an eclectic collection of rental barracks and disjointed RV parking. But, it was immediately adjacent to downtown, with sites that fronted the bay
and a beautiful little harbor with paint-a-picture views.
The town itself has some really cool buildings, but we liked this one the best.
Classic architecture abounded, especially if you’re into
Big thumbs up for both Anacortes and Port Townsend!
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