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On a recent trip to the Up & Over we hit the jackpot. A quaint little town with art galleries, a great bar with live music on the weekends (the Edison), a nice little bakery (Breadfarm), an awesome breakfast spot (Tweets), a treasure-filled antique/vintage/salvage shop (The Lucky Dumpster), an Italian-like wine & cheese place (Slough Food), and a farm-fresh sandwich/espresso shop (Farm to Market Bakery). Water access in town via the Edison Slough to nearby Samish Bay sealed a future deal for us - we'll be back soon to kayak to and from this undiscovered Northwest adventure town.         A 1.5 hour drive north from Seattle brings you up & over to Edison. It sits just off the scenic Chuckanut Drive (dear non-Northwest folk - yep, it's called Chuckanut) and is set up near the Puget Sound in the sunny, farm-filled Skagit Valley. Follow the Edison Slough, a shallow waterway right in town behind all of these businesses, and you'll shoot out into Samish Bay.      When we arrived in town on a weekday in the summer the streets were quiet. Coming from the city, this was a change we welcomed. We were looking for a bite so we stopped by the Farm to Market Bakery. We got there just in time - after we showed up a group of cyclists pulled in for lunch. With the less-traveled, flat, scenic roads out here it's no wonder cyclists are all over it. Keep heading north from here on Chuckanut and you've got views of the San Juans, forest trails, oyster farms, historic inns, and even some state park land, all the way to Bellingham.   As we walked around the place after lunch we found a cool little wood shop to explore, several galleries, and the Lucky Dumpster vintage store.       Pictured below is your ticket to and from town to the sea…the Edison Slough. Just make sure you wait for high tide. Our plan for next time? Stay at a rental on nearby Samish Island and paddle over to Edison for the day. We'll sweet talk the friendly folks at Slough Food to leave our kayaks near their quaint little outdoor slough dining area, then hit the town. We'll do it soon since this undiscovered adventure town won't be undiscovered for long…the word is officially out…first one to open a B&B in Edison wins!!! ~Paul & Amber ETC   
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 Hello! Happy winter kayaking! With the summer river list intact, I decided to try and knock one off before summer. It was a crisp and forecasted sunny day in the Northwest. It also happened to be post-fowl hunting season around these parts. I did some research on the internet on the Skagit River mouth...apparently there are several hundred thousand (yes that is correct, several hundred thousand) ducks, snow geese, and other birds wintering in the Skagit River mouth. Operation snow geese was about to commence.  ...about to commence...until we stepped out of the car and the wind was coming off of the Sound at about 40 knots. Not to mention that the river where we were gonna put in was heading against the wind (a.k.a. waves). So, we wimped out and drove a little bit farther North to Samish Island (see our other post on the 'island' here). I knew that Samish Bay would be protected from the wind and we could thus paddle on the leeward side of the island (P.S. It must be a Northwest thing - we have a lot of islands that aren't really islands...not sure why this is, I'll report back when I find out).   If you head over to Samish there is just one place with official beach access, look for the beach access sign (pictured at the end of this post). There are a few portable toilets there, places to park for free, and a little trail down to the beach. Operation snow geese yielded only a field of geese (pic earlier). We've got until April when most of the birds leave...at least we got some beautiful kayaking in! ~Paul & John ETC Update: Just added some video from the paddle...           Everyone's Travel Club left the city and took a little trip up North, mainly just to drive around aimlessly on a sunny winter day. We followed the sun (seriously - we looked west from Bellingham and saw that it was sunny, so we went that way) to little Samish Island (map).      The island really isn't an island, more like a peninsula. It's small and pretty quiet with a few camps that operate in nicer weather, a few churches, one B & B, some vacation rentals, and a small whiskey distillery. I can't say there is even a restaurant, coffee shop, and definitely not a gas station...but...beautiful.    We'll definitely be back, with kayaks... ~Paul & Amber ETC  |
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