100 Days 48 States - The Journey

"Follow your own path no matter what people say."
– Karl Marx

TODAY’S ROUTE:
Anacortes, WA to Seattle, WA: Ferry to Friday Harbor, Ferry back to Anacortes, SR-20 South to Oak Harbor the Coupeville, SR-525 South to Clinton, Ferry to Mukilteo, SR-526 East to I-5 South to Seattle. (MAP)

THE DETAILS:
Puget Sound is a wondrous region filed with history and beauty. Dozens of islands fill the waterway between Seattle, The Olympic Peninsula and Canada’s Victoria Island. And the best way to experience them is via the Washington State Ferry system. Water is such a part of life around here that taking a ferry is simply part of a daily commute. At 7:50 AM I’m aboard the Evergreen State, headed over to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. The boat holds 100 cars and 1,000 passengers and the round-trip fare for a motorcycle and passenger is $9.80, a bargain for a 2-hour ride.

San Juan Island feels a lot like Nantucket to me. There are no traffic lights and no commercial stores, but there’s a lot of history here. In the 1800's, the British jointly occupied the island with American settlers, resulting from The Oregon Treaty of 1846, which settled the nation’s boundary at the 49^th parallel. The treaty’s wording left unclear who owned the San Juan Islands. A crisis arose on June 15, 1859, when an American settler named Lyman Cutlar shot and killed a pig belonging to the Hudson Bay Company because it was rooting in his garden. The dispute over who really owned the island erupted and both British and American forces amassed on the tiny island. Five British Warships mounting 167 guns and carrying 2,140 troops opposed an American force of 461. A war was about to erupt over the death of a pig!

Cooler heads prevailed and a settlement was eventually reached. The island remained under joint military occupation until 1872 when Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany was asked to settle the boundary. The line was drawn through Haro Strait and San Juan became an American possession.

I tour around the island, visiting both the British and American camps, now part of the San Juan National Historic Park. I stop at Lime Kiln Point State Park on the western shore to check out the lighthouse. I walk down the path to the rocky shore and there a couple from Ohio asks me "Did you see them?" "See what?" I ask. "The whales!", they exclaim. "Oh, those whales!" I reply. A group of three killer whales entertains us for about 20 minutes as they feed off the coast known as Deadman Bay.

By noon I’m heading back to Anacortes, on another ferry. It’s so easy to travel around on these boats by motorcycle. They just move you right to the head of the line and zip you right in. No waiting in the long line of cars. Cool! I ride down Whidbey Island and stop in the tiny town of Coupeville, the center of Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve. The area here preserves an unbroken historical record of Puget Sound exploration from the 19^th century to the present. The stamp for Ebey’s Landing is hard to find, as there are no federal facilities here, just the Island County Historical Museum. The stamp is hidden inside. But I have no problem finding the French Apple ice cream at the Hole in The Wall Ice Cream Parlor, located at 21 NW Front Street. Good stuff.

At Clinton I take my last ferry of the day across to Mukilteo and then down into Seattle. There’s a lot of traffic here on the interstate and I’m not used to riding with so many other vehicles. It’s a little strange after being out on the open road for so long.

I decide to splurge a bit, to regroup in comfort. So I check into a nice hotel with lots of space, indoor parking, and of course a laundry room. I do my laundry for the 6^th time. This is getting a little redundant. Maybe I should just turn my underwear inside out.

For dinner I head downtown to the Stars Restaurant where my dear friend Juliet Sampson’s sister Jenny works as a line cook. In 1985 I met Juliet and Jenny, with their parents and brother John, on the Island of Moorea, near Tahiti. They were on vacation and so was my family. We all hit it off. I haven’t seen Jenny in 13 years, but she looks the same. She’s lived here in Seattle for five years now, and just loves the place. It’s a lot like her hometown of San Francisco. She also enjoys working at Stars, and I can understand why. The restaurant is visually striking and the food is just as impressive.

Jenny spent four months on the road last year, traveling around the country by herself in a VW Vanagon, taking some extraordinary pictures along the way. So we’ve got a lot to talk about and catch up on. Before we know it, it’s four in the morning. But who cares, all I have to do is ride down to Mt. Rainier tomorrow. But oh, I’m supposed to camp again. We’ll see how that goes.

THE DAILY TAKE:
Miles Today: 121.4
Total Miles: 14,366
Time on Motorcycle: 3 Hours 40 Minutes
Average Speed: 33.8 MPH
States Visited today: 1 (WA)
Total States Visited: 30
National Park Service Passport Stamps: 2
NPS Stamp totals: 108 Stamps, 27 States
Weather: Low hanging clouds in morning, clearing by noon.
Number of ferries in the Washington State Ferry System: 25

SEEN ON THE ROAD:
"Delay Of 5 Vehicles Illegal. Slower Traffic Use Pullouts" – signs all over the Puget Sound Area.

RANDOM PASSINGS:
On the boat back from Friday Harbor, I meet Teresa, a young lady from San Juan Island who’s riding her Harley over to Seattle for the weekend. She used to live in Hawaii and worked at the motorcycle dealership there where they sell BMW's, among others. The back of her helmet has a popular sticker that reads "Loud Pipes Save Lives." Her motorcycle tries to prove the point.

My BMW motorcycle is quiet, and that’s the way I like it. Frankly, I don’t think loud pipes save anything and in fact they are the main reason why many people don’t like motorcycles. Many Harley owners take off their mufflers as soon as they get the bike and put on straight pipes, making their bikes environmental nuisances. Loud pipes are the reason I couldn’t ride into Baxter State Park on Day 4. There are few things on the road I find as annoying as an absurdly loud motorcycle cruising down the street.

Teresa, you can keep your loud pipes and your Harley. Have fun and stay safe. For me, I prefer the quiet purr of a well-tuned machine from the Bavarian Motor Works.