Month: August 2024

On our way back to the Motherland last Wednesday, we hit our first fog of the summer.  Fog sucks.  This was extra odd fog that mostly sat on the water up to about forty feet.  Pleasure boats were invisible, but fortunately we could make out the top of the bulk carrier Dijima as she angled toward our certain death.*

The good news is that after God created fog He invented AIS and radar, although all the mariners who died in fog-related incidents through the ages might argue He waited too long to do so.  The fog momentarily lifted so that we could see a picturesque shed where there should’ve been a lighthouse, and nobody crashed into us.

Very odd weather indeed.

Another oddity is the international border in these parts.  Because the same buffoons who created the ambiguity that sparked The Pig War a few posts ago also left a zigzag border in the path between Sidney and Point Roberts.

Now about Point Roberts.   Point Roberts geopolitically is the weirdest patch of land in these United States.  The Treaty of 1818 established the 49th parallel as the primary border with what now is Canada, which worked just fine between places that don’t really matter, like, say, North Dakota and Saskatchewan.  But British sniveling about Victoria being south of the line prompted another round of negotiations.  Hence the Oregon Treaty of 1846, which gave us the aforementioned goofy zigzag.  In addition to the other screw-ups, the treaty drafters failed to recognize that since 1818 a tiny dangly bit had been hanging down below the border like a 4.8 square mile sized udder.  Point Roberts.  If only they’d consulted Google Maps.

Because the treaty could’ve fixed the problem but didn’t, Americans stuck living on that udder now can’t leave unless they have a boat or a plane or cross an international border.  Kids go to school in Blaine, which means at least two border crossings a day.  The poor slobs in Point Roberts rely on Canadians in Delta or Tsawwassen for water, and fire suppression, and those giant barrels of cheese balls from Costco that nobody ever finishes.  Absurd.**

According to a long-time resident we met, back in the day Point Roberts was quite the den of iniquity.  Canadians streamed across the border every weekend to engage in all manner of mortal sin like drinking, gambling, fornicating with prostitutes, and cheering for the University of Alabama.  Now it seems the biggest excitement is Green Waste Solutions Day at the Community Center.

The marina is pleasant enough though, full of Canadian boats, and—according to the first sign totem pole we’ve ever seen that points only to places we’ve actually been—conveniently located.

Perhaps not surprisingly, restaurants aren’t exactly plentiful on Point Roberts.  One Google reviewer, however, praised the Saltwater Cafe’s grilled cheese sandwiches.  We do love a good grilled cheese sandwich—and the fellow who answered the phone said we could eat on the dog-friendly patio—so all three of us trudged a mile and a half to get to the place.  Only for them to tell us that they’d “run out of food.”  WTF?  No bread left?  No cheese left?  Come on Nancy, make us a grilled cheese.***  But a nice man heard one of us grumbling that the fellow who answered the phone could’ve mentioned the whole “we’re out of food” thing when we asked about eating on the patio, and gave us a ride back to the boat.  Incidentally, here’s “town.”

Decent enough stop, but we probably won’t go back.  We did go back to Blaine though.  We’re killing time until we pick up Shannon and Ray in Seattle, and last time in Blaine we were so cold and focused on moving the boat that we didn’t see much.  Also, nothing had opened for spring yet.

Blaine is famous for several things, the first being where our Cholla pickleball friend Bill and Bill’s wife Melanie live when it’s too hot to live in Scottsdale.  They’re world travelers who rent boats on the canals of Europe, which is next on our to-do list after Alaska.  Great to spend some time with them aboard Tumbleweed and at dinner.

Bill and Melanie used to live on Point Roberts, so also had first-hand knowledge of the travails facing residents.  They mentioned that many folks in Witness Protection move to Point Roberts, which we sort of confirmed through research that consisted of exactly one humorous article in Vancouver Magazine:  What’s the Point of Point Roberts?

Blaine also is famous as the Peace Arch City, although not too famous because we’d never heard of the Peace Arch until this summer.

Here’s the Peace Arch, which bisects the border and seemingly invites people to risk arrest and deportation by walking under it.  Also, who’s this mother we share with Canadians?  Mother Earth?  Mother Ocean?  Mother England?  Old Mother Hubbard?  And whose father shacked up with baby mama first?  So many questions.

No wall on this border.  Not even a river.  Just a small ditch that the nice Canadians from Surrey can step across anytime they want a glass of fresh brewed unsweetened iced tea, which we deduce is illegal in their country.

Despite appearances, this isn’t a photo of downtown Blaine at almost exactly 11:00.  It’s a photo of Sammy at almost exactly 11:00.

Next stop, Anacortes.  Again.  Which is fine, because we like the place.  And we really like the scenery along the way.

Although we’ve pretty much covered Anacortes in prior posts, the blog serves as our travel diary so we have to mention at least a couple of things.  This guy at the bar by Cap Sante, for example, was awesome.

And we managed to leave the Anacortes Art Festival with only four purchases.  Crazy.

Next up, the Swinomish Channel on the way to La Conner.  Even southbound it still looks a lot like stretches of the ICW.

We’ve visited La Conner before, but never by boat.  Turns out the town is just about the same as when you go by car.  Very cute.

This is “The Old Fir Log.”  Seriously.  That’s its official name.  Discovered as a remnant of logging in 1958, someone saved it, cleaned it, and counted growth rings.  Over 800 years.  This bad boy was growing before the Magna Carta set forth the apparently-outdated notion that Kings aren’t above the law.  Before Marco Polo invented that dumb swimming pool game.  Before Chinese fireworkers harnessed the creative power of gunpowder.  Before Nick Saban started cheating.  It’s that’s old.

Speaking of trees, these fools seem to think autumn is here.  Our Phoenix friends currently are fleeing 115°.  Football is still four weeks away.  What the heck is going on?

Dirty Biter was a beloved La Conner town dog, who hung around the tavern eating table scraps but also migrated nightly from house to house.  He tragically died while engaged in one of his favorite pastimes.  The name of the dog that won that street fight is lost to history, but Dirty Biter has a park and a statute.

Then a long but uneventful cruise down to Kingston.  Yup, our third Kingston, but the first one that isn’t in either New York or Ontario.

After a close call related to some poor info from the dock attendant, we tied up next to Lucky Dog, another NPY49.  Gorgeous boat.  Like looking in a mirror.

We’ll be back in a few weeks with more time to explore Kingston, so basically we’ll leave it with just one town photo in this post.  Seems like it might be a fun little stop.

Today we jumped across the Sound to Elliott Bay.****  The soaring Magnolia Bluffs along the way once were home to Fort Lawton, a military base that ended up playing an insignificant role in history, although troops passed through on their way elsewhere and some German POWs were imprisoned there for a short stretch.  The Magnolia Bluffs are cool enough, but don’t eat at Maggie Bluffs restaurant at the marina unless you crave horrible food.  Maggie Bluffs sucks as much as fog.

Yup, tonight we’ll be sleeping in Seattle, where we’re staging for tomorrow when our baby and her boyfriend arrive for a few days.  Wooo!

Here’s the cruise for this post.

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* Maybe it wasn’t fog at all.  Maybe it was smoggy smoke.  Know where there ain’t no smoggy smoke?  That’s right, baby, Good ol’ Rocky Top, that’s where!  Rocky Top, Tennessee.  Everybody sing along!

** Before some smartass from Manitoba or Minnesota chimes in, we know that there’s a similar bit of goofiness at the Northwest Angle and Elm Point.  However, we haven’t been to either place and pretty much nobody lives there, so those don’t matter.  What does matter is that Elm Point and the Northwest Angle are on Lake of the Woods, and Trevor thoughtfully brought us a suitcase full of delicious craft beer and shirts and other stuff from Lake of the Woods when he and Brenda visited.

*** Special meaningless congratulations to anyone who recognized this as our first Step Brothers reference.

**** “Elliott?  You’re gonna name the kid Elliott?  You can’t name the kid Elliott.  Nooo.  Elliott is a fat kid with glasses who eats paste.”  – Walter “Gib” Gibson

Did we mention that the good folks at Elliott Bay Marina didn’t answer our radio calls, which forced us to dock in a too-narrow spot with no assistance?  Well that’s what happened.  But Shannon and Ray made it in from Napa, so our moods brightened considerably.  Always great to see our baby.

After an evening of cards and other funny business, time to head out to Port Orchard.  Past the cruise ships.  By the way, thousands of people pay to take one of these up to Juneau and back.  In seven days.  Did we mention that’s round trip?  In seven days?  To Juneau?  Ridiculous.

If one were to search long and hard enough for remnants of the original orchard that gave Port Orchard its name, one would be very disappointed indeed.  Because Port Orchard honors Mr. H. M. Orchard, a clerk on one of George Vancouver’s Puget Sound expeditions, although it wasn’t called Puget Sound at the time.  There never was an actual orchard.  Whatever.

After a day of cruising, and exploring shops (Dana), or hanging out at Blue Goose Tavern (everyone but Dana), mostly we played games.  Although we raised our girls to be independent, confident, and strong, it’s comforting to know that at least one of us still has superpowers: “Mom!  Dad keeps wiggling his finger at me!  Make him stop!”

Shannon won the Catan game as usual, but Doug won the much more important game of Annoy Shannon.

While at the Blue Goose we asked the locals if anyone famous lives in Port Orchard.  Basically they said no.  Which means either (1) they’ve never heard of Delilah or (2) they don’t think she’s worthy of mentioning.  Yup, that same dopey Delilah who babbles incessantly on KEZ when Dana insists on listening to Christmas music lives in Port Orchard.

The other important moment at the Blue Goose was when Shannon and Ray learned about the 5th Annual Kitsap County Cornhole Classic, a tournament with prizes that included “cash, trophies, and bragging rights.”  Since Shannon and Ray fancy themselves to be expert cornholers and since we had nothing else planned, they signed up.

Their first match unfortunately involved the reigning champs, which led to an embarrassing shut-out for Team Tumbleweed.

But no worries.  They later redeemed themselves by squeaking out a win over Ninja Turtles, the last-place team comprised of an exasperated father and an eight-year-old son playing for the first time at regulation distance.  Sammy didn’t seem impressed.*

Shannon and Ray won no cash.  No trophy.  No bragging rights.  But they did score a raffle prize worth $25 at Brickhouse 714, where that very evening The Hoffmans—a local country band—were scheduled to play.  Grab up the cards and let’s go.

During a break, Hoffman the Elder stopped by our table.  As required by common decency if not by law, Doug asked if they knew Rocky Top.  “No,” the man said, “but if you’re from Tennessee we have something you’ll like.”  Grrr.  Shannon predicted that we’d get the bastardized Chris Stapleton version of “Tennessee Whiskey.”  Grrr.  Yup, that’s what we got, and to make matters worse everyone bullied Doug into smiling at the band as if it was enjoyable.  Grrr.  Other than that, the music was great.

A couple of other things.  Port Orchard has our first Lego store.  Full of everything imaginable related to Legos.  Odd name though.  Did they misspell “Alley?”

And a car show.  We’re not that into car shows, but Doc Brown’s DeLorean was kind of cool.

Speaking of cars, the ports of Seattle and Tacoma offload some 200,000 vehicles every year.  Which explains why Roll On, Roll Off ships are anchored all up and down Puget Sound.  As an example, here’s RCC Compass waiting her turn.

Standing tall in Pete Ohman’s backyard above the Colvos Passage is a 55-foot replica of the Washington Monument.  His dad Stan built it some twenty years ago, after Pete and his drinking buddies came up with the idea.  We’d probably like hanging out with Pete and Stan.

The smoke and clouds parted just enough for a crappy photo of Mount Rainier.  Better than nothing.

Remember those crazy videos of Galloping Gertie?  The first bridge at Tacoma Narrows collapsed after fluttering spectacularly in windstorm-driven mechanical resonance.  We didn’t go down the narrows, but in another brush with history we passed close enough for a photo of the replacement bridge.

Then in to Gig Harbor.

The daily gloom didn’t seem to faze the Venetian gondoliers.

We’ll be back to Gig Harbor over Labor Day weekend, so didn’t do much exploring.  This trip mostly was about Shannon and Ray.  A window of sunshine allowed a dinghy ride around the harbor.

The harbor seal we passed didn’t seem impressed.**

On their last day, the kids took the kayaks for a morning spin.  Those fuzzy little specks down towards the lower right corner of the drone photo aren’t crumbs on your screen.  They’re Shannon and Ray.

Here’s a better shot of them.

But all good things must come to an end, as the cliche goes.  In our context that meant taking Shannon and Ray across to Des Moines to catch their flight from SeaTac.  Along the way we passed the Point Robinson Lighthouse.  The guy behind the fabulous Bloom County comic strip wrote Red Ranger Came Calling, a children’s book heavily featuring Point Robinson and the lighthouse.  Supposedly orca pods periodically have played around Point Robinson since the first light was constructed in 1887, although based on our experience we’re skeptical.

We got a nice spot on the visitor dock at Des Moines and might’ve stayed longer, but Ted Bundy killed one of his early victims around there so it seemed wiser to just walk to Wally’s for a delicious farewell lunch and then head back to Gig Harbor.

Awesome few days, but not long enough.  Sad to see them go.

Although Gig Harbor is charming and famous and historical, this time around it’s mostly just been a place to stop.  So after a quick turnaround and a photo of the cool little underwater world off our stern, we headed back to Seattle.

Here’s the Alki Point Lighthouse, guarding the southern entrance to Elliott Bay.  No, it’s not the tall thing.  The tall thing is the Space Needle.  The lighthouse is the thing in front.

Washington trivia time!  Washington is the only state without an official motto.  “Alki,” however is the unofficial one.  It’s a Chinook word meaning “By and by,” which frankly seems like a dumb motto.  But we rounded Alki Point safely and headed into the city.

Sammy’s 4:00 walk took us down a path of sculptures, which maybe we’ll cover further next time we’re here.  As a taste though, here’s a naked guy named Sam.  Or maybe SAM is the Seattle Art Museum.

Seattle’s Pike Place Market is on every visitor’s must-do list, so of course we went.

Since it’s on every visitor’s must-do list perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised to find all those visitors clogging up the joint, but we hate crowds so only stayed long enough to buy some pasta.  And nuts.  And bread.  And a candle.

Seattle is home to the first Starbucks, and buying something at the first Starbucks apparently is on the must-do list of enough people to create a block-long line.  Fortunately, the first Starbucks was on our must-skip list so we just walked on by and by.

As documented in this blog, we’ve seen some things.  Scary things.  Interesting things.  Clever things.  Funny things.  Dumb things.  Not any really disgusting things, though.  Until now.  The gum wall along Post Alley is so disgusting that Dana turned around just as we reached the smell.  Hundreds of gross people a day stick their gum on top of gum left by prior generations of gross people.  Now that’s disgusting.

There’s a lot of Seattle we’re missing, and possibly some of it is neither crowded nor disgusting.  Maybe next time.  Tomorrow Sammy’s other sister arrives.  Wooo!

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* As uncomfortable as it looks to rest your chin on the arm of a folding chair, the arm of a folding chair has to be better than, say, a dock cleat.

** See footnote * above.

We start this post with the most important highlight: Mallory and her girlfriend Cali made it to Seattle from San Clemente!  Wooo!  Despite the fact that they love The Office—and Dwight Schrute III was born in Seattle—nobody really wanted to stay in Seattle, so about as fast as we could we headed out for Bremerton.

One thing we’ve learned about Puget Sound is that those Washington State ferries are everywhere.  Damn near as annoying as sailboats.  And Walla Walla is the ferry that seems to take particular pleasure in getting in our way whenever possible.  Here she is after zooming past us in Elliott Bay.  As clearly shown in this photo, the ferries basically are big floating tubes that eat cars on one end and poop them out the other end.

We had high hopes for Bremerton.  Meh.  Maybe if the weather had been a bit better . . .  Or maybe not, bless its heart.

Fortunately, cloudy skies don’t prevent card games.  Cali showed the camera what appears to be a winning Monopoly Deal hand, but the rest of us failed to look at the photo in a timely manner and thus didn’t take advantage of her foolishness.

Bremerton turns out to be a Navy town.  Who knew?  Along the marina sits USS Turner Joy, a Forrest Sherman-class destroyer built in Puget Sound and now serving as a museum.  We didn’t have time to visit—which is disappointing—but hopefully next time.

Even farther down the Sinclair Inlet sits the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, which has been building and servicing warships since 1891.  As of 1891 most of our conflicts had involved European adversaries—which would suggest that the biggest need for naval vessels would be on the East Coast—but maybe the Pig War was still on the minds of the folks who plan these things.

One might think that the Sinclair Inlet is narrow and shallow such that Korean War era destroyers are about the largest ships that might jam into the shipyard.  Nope.  Just a few short days ago, for example, after ten years in Japan,  USS Ronald Reagan—a Nimitz-class nuclear aircraft carrier—cruised in for an oil change and other routine maintenance.  Very cool.  We would’ve approached for a better view, but, um, the patrol boat with the machine gun made that seem unwise.

What we really looked forward to seeing, though, was Poulsbo.  Coincidentally the Pleasant Harbor Yacht Club was sponsoring a cruise to Poulsbo, which also gave us a chance to meet some of our clubmates.  Wooo!  So we headed up to Liberty Bay.

Poulsbo is all about its Norwegian roots, which of course go all the way back to the 1880s after the native Suquamish people were shoved onto a reservation.  So basically a modern-day Viking plunder.  But any residual ugliness is long gone, replaced by flags and cute shops and all things Norway.  Heck, we even found lutefisk tacos on a menu.

Poulsbo turns out to be great.  We plan to return with our friends Tom and Deb, who are Danish and Finnish respectively.  Since Denmark and Finland basically are the same as Norway we figure they’ll love the lutefisk tacos.

Another fun coincidence is that we hit Poulsbo during the art festival.  Even better than the art were The Foundlings, a couple of Irish guys.  Fabulous.

Mallory and Doug waited an hour for the next band.  Um, less than fabulous.  Bring back The Foundlings, please.  But at least there were a lot of cute dogs running around.

Now about the yacht club.  We loved meeting other boaters from Pleasant Harbor.  Huge fun.  Great people.  We’re hoping a couple of the boats might even join us on next summer’s trip to Alaska.

Hours later, the evening ended very poorly for Slippery Pig patrons when Mallory and Cali took the stage.  Perhaps instead of a Mamma Mia song they should’ve chosen Jimmy Buffet’s more appropriate “Too Drunk to Karaoke.”

Speaking of horror, Saturday night a massive thunderstorm storm smashed into Puget Sound.  Which was great for dudes fighting those wildfires but sucky for Sammy, who needed shore leave in the dark of night.  And sucky for Dana, who earlier in the day bartered away her right to stay dry and make Doug take the lil guy out.  Here they are coming back in what looks like a rainy day but really was a rainy sky lit by lightning.

Don’t believe that photo was taken at night during a lightning flash?  Here’s the next photo in the series.

Upon return, Dana reported the carnage unfolding at the art festival, where several vendors had left their wares in pop-ups.  The next morning we could see the damage.

We thankfully survived the tempest, however, and made our way into town for a delicious breakfast.

With the storm cleared out, time to pop down the kayaks.  The kids returned with stories of harbor seals spotted from a distance along the way.  Silly girls.  They thought they’d seen something special.

After everyone but Doug and Sammy finally exhausted the supply of little shops to explore, we settled back into card games.  Somewhat shockingly the Slippery Pig allowed Mallory and Cali back, although we were sitting outside so they probably figured the other customers were safe.  Then we noticed storm clouds.  “Rain in 13 minutes” what?  The remaining vendors were scrambling around as we ran back to get the boat ready for another storm.

The wind whipped up two-footers and the rain pelted us, but just as quickly things calmed back down.  Whew.

Sadly, yesterday was return-to-home day for our baby and Cali.  Before shoving off, however, we took the kayaks for a spin ourselves.  Hey girls, this is what a special seal experience looks like.

Most Washington State ferries labor in obscurity, which probably is fine with them.  Not Elwha.  Elwha was infamous in Puget Sound.  In 1983, Captain Billy Fittro invited a comely passenger he fancied into the pilothouse.  His efforts to woo the lady literally took a turn for the worse when he decided to drive the ferry—loaded with a hundred passengers and dozens of cars—off course so she could see her home from the water.  The collision with what now is charted as “Elwha Rock” caused significant damage and led to Captain Billy becoming just plain Billy.  In 1990 Elwha lost her mooring lines in hurricane-force winds and nearly sank.  In 1999, a computer glitch led to steering failure, whereupon she smashed into the Orcas Island Ferry Dock, which in turn caused significant damage to both the ferry and the shore infrastructure.  Rumors of Elwha being cursed circulated through the ferry system for years.

A few days ago, we read a Seattle Times article about Elwha and a sister ferry being sold for scrap.  An interesting story to be sure, but the part about August 19 being the day the two ships left Seattle for good scarcely registered.  Until, that is, we reached Elliott Bay yesterday and saw a ferry being pushed by a tugboat.  Yup, Elwha.  How cool is that?

Now the bad part.  We really don’t get to see our kids enough, so it’s always traumatic to let them go again.  But at least we had a few awesome days before they left.

The next stretch will be rather uneventful boating unless something eventful happens along the way.  We’re heading back to Pleasant Harbor for a week before returning to Gig Harbor for Labor Day.  Then a week in Tacoma for some boat stuff.  Fortunately, football season is upon us.  Wooo!

Exhausted from family revelry though we were, we made some time to work in a little more of Seattle.  First up, the Space Needle, aka Dr. Evil’s Starbucks Lair.  Built for the 1962 World’s Fair, the 605-foot iconic landmark looms above the city like a flying saucer.  But let’s be real.  Knoxville’s Sunsphere—centerpiece of the 1982 World’s Fair—offers views of Neyland Stadium and the Tennessee River and costs only $5 to enjoy.  Far superior.  The Space Needle charges $40.  We didn’t pay the $40, but here it is.

Next up, Chihuly Garden and Glass.  Dale Chihuly arguably is the greatest glass artist of our time.  We’ve enjoyed his exhibits at the Phoenix Botanical Garden, but Seattle is home to the largest permanent collection of his work.  Perhaps that’s because he was born near Seattle, attended college in Seattle, and founded an internationally-acclaimed glass-blowing school near Seattle.  Whatever.  His glass is spectacular.

One last tidbit.  Bell Harbor Marina is at historic Pier 66.  Pier 66 is located on what was the site of a camp called Muck-muck-wum before the wheels of progress ran smack over the Duwamish Indians who lived there.  It’s possible, of course, that the Duwamish weren’t even that upset at losing their land.  “Muck-muck-wum” doesn’t sound very pleasant.  Anyway, we docked at Bell Harbor.

Sometime during the night before we left, an apartment building named Norwegian Sun pulled into Pier 66.   Hmmm.  Norway again.  Wonder if they serve lutefisk tacos on the trip up to Alaska.

Here’s another lighthouse, although there’s no point.  Seriously.  It’s the Point No Point Light, out on Point No Point.  Built in 1879, it’s the oldest lighthouse on Puget Sound.  For $250 per night, the former lightkeeper’s residence is available to rent.  Two night minimum.  No pets allowed, but if you’re into driftwood this might be the place for you.

Then back into Port Ludlow for a quick one-nighter.

Lulu the duck wasn’t around this time, but Doug popped up to the Port Ludlow Yacht Club to meet some of the local boaters.  Dale—the incoming Commodore—was tending the bar.  Dale’s wife Kathleen is unwilling to be “co-Commodore” like our own Mauri Miner, so she’s going with “Commadorable.”  Cute.  Nice folks up at the clubhouse.

As we’ve previously noted, the trip to and from our Pleasant Harbor slip goes past Naval Base Kitsap, home to most of the country’s Trident submarines.  The world’s largest collection of armed nuclear warheads sits right there.  This time through, nice fellows on a Coast Guard patrol boat stopped by to tell us to move over because a sub was heading our way.  Since one dude actually was manning the machine gun—and since they stayed about thirty feet off our port side until they were satisfied that even with our Coast Guard mandated flare gun and vicious chihuahua we didn’t pose much of a threat—we figured they meant business.

Wooo!  Our first submarine in the wild!  The only bad thing is that we wasted lines from The Hunt for Red October that time we posted about the British sub we saw in a pen at Kings Bay Submarine Base in Georgia.  No pings, Visaly, but this was way cooler.

Despite a solid effort we were unable to identify the submarine.  Probably on purpose.  The ship guarding her, however, is USNS Arrowhead, a 250-foot Submarine and Special Warfare Support Vessel that has more and bigger artillery than that little range boat.

As we approached Pleasant Harbor, the 2620 Road Fire was busily burning up the side of the Mount Jupiter foothills.  These fires are so sad.  This one was less than five miles from our spot at the marina, but between the prevailing wind direction and the periodic whomp-whomp-whomp of the helicopters, we figured to be pretty safe.

Unfortunately for us but fortunately for the good folks fighting the fire, cold and drizzle settled in.

As fun as it is to sit inside a boat for a few cold and drizzly days, however, it’s really not that fun.  So on Another Pleasant Harbor Sunday,* we decided to go see Leavenworth.  What’s the point of leaving a truck at our marina unless we use it?

Leavenworth— deep along the Cascade Loop—is the wurst place we’ve been all summer.  Bratwurst.  Liverwurst.  Weisswurst.  Curry Wurst.  Knackwurst.  Yuck.  Leavenworth is a “Bavarian Village,” however, so we guess it makes sense.**

In addition to German food and bad “wurst” puns, Leavenworth has the Nutcracker Museum, which we visited from just outside the rope with the “$5 entry” sign.  Cool place.  Nutcrackers dating to the 1700s.  All things nutcracker related were available from the museum gift shop.  Dana snagged a puzzle.

In keeping with the whole “Bavaria” thing, Leavenworth also has several places selling authentic Black Forest cuckoo clocks.  The big clock in town, however, appeared to be broken.  No clockworks.  No bird.

We did find a house, however, that some folks might find a little cuckoo.

Yesterday’s sunshine allowed a stroll to and along the Wenatchee River, which was a superhighway for moving logs down to local sawmills back in the early timber days.  Pilings dating to those days still stick up here and there.

Nowadays, the Wenatchee River mostly irrigates apple orchards.  We found miles of them stretched across the plains as we approached Cashmere, where we wanted to check out the sweaters.

Turns out Cashmere isn’t famous for sweaters after all.  Nope, Cashmere’s claim to fame is Aplet and Cotlet production.

We’d never heard of Aplets and Cotlets before, but they have quite a following in the apple-producing part of Washington.  Made semi-famous at that same 1962 World’s Fair that gave us the Space Needle, at one point Aplets and Cotlets almost were Washington’s official candy but then the equally-powerful lobby from the Almond Roca region defeated the movement.

Liberty Orchards in Cashmere is the only place making these things, so of course we stopped in to try some.  Um, no thanks.  In the battle for official candyhood, put us on Team Almond Roca.

Can’t get much more patriotic than Washington, apples, and Liberty Orchards, right?  Wrong!  Liberty Orchards is owned by Russians.  True fact.  Every penny they make probably goes straight to Putin and his evil war machine.  Hell, the factory workers probably spy on our submarines in their off time.  Team Almond Roca?  More like Team America, we say.

Dana did buy some good looking wafers and chocolate bars from Liberty Orchards, however, never bothering to look at the fine print.  Outrageous.

So Cashmere has Russian spies, soon-to-expire Russian chocolate, and modern apartments, but not much else.

Peshastin Pinnacles State Park sits along the road between Leavenworth and Cashmere.  The one of us with four legs wasn’t up for the full hike around but we did make it through one of the more picturesque gates you’ll find at a park entrance.

Today we bounced back to Pleasant Harbor to prep for our last month aboard.  Nothing exciting about that.  One last thing about Pleasant Harbor though.  One evening we went up to the restaurant to investigate the melodious harmonies drifting down towards Tumbleweed.  The band Mother, Daughter, and a Dude Named Greg was playing old country and bluegrass.  Awesome.  The best of all the acts we’ve seen up here.***

Chores tomorrow, long day to Seattle on Thursday.

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* “Hey, hey, we’re the Monkees.”

** Truth be told, Leavenworth, Washington, isn’t really in Bavaria.  After the sawmills closed, the town was sliding through hard times until the 1960s, when a revitalization committee hit upon the theme as a way to attract tourist dollars.  Now there’s a strict building code that allows only slight variations on that theme.  Autumn leaves, Oktoberfest, Christmas, and seasonal festivals attract visitors all year, so apparently it’s working.

*** Okay, that probably isn’t the band’s actual name, but we arrived on the scene after they started playing so don’t know for certain.  What we do know for certain is that it was a mother, her daughter, and a dude named Greg, and that they were fabulous.