As we continue to explore Washington state's San Juan Islands for an upcoming summer paddle, we had to stop by Roche Harbor. Located on San Juan Island, Roche Harbor has a lot going on. It is a popular port of entry for boats entering the US from Canada, especially in the summer. The historic buildings and lime kilns are what's left of a once thriving lime business - the company once upon a time shipped island lime to major west coast cities (read more about the industry in another ETC post here).

   If you head to Roche Harbor by car like we did, you'll arrive in 'town' after you drive under a big resort sign. We actually avoided the road at first - not knowing anything about the history of the Harbor - but eventually had no other choice, there is pretty much just one road.
   "I don't want to go to a resort," I said to my wife. "I want to go to Roche Harbor - the town."
   Well, it turns out the resort is the town. The town is the resort…hmmm…interesting. The details of how this town/resort came to be is best explained here & here. 
   It's quite simple really. What you've basically got historically is a late 1800s British/American border feud that escalated into a full-blown pig war (with apparently only one casualty…uh…the pig), mixed later with a discovery of precious limestone and land claim by a Tacoma dude ("there's lime in them hills!"), a later purchase of the grounds by a family who started making the marina nice and welcoming guests, and then another purchase of the same land by some Seattle business folks who have really made the resort into, well, a resort. 
   Roche Harbor went from native land, to a pig war zone, to a bustling lime operation, to a boatel (before the old hotel was refinished), to what it is now - a great marina and resort village with condos sprinkled amongst ruins & a few 100 year old buildings (including the iconic Hotel de Haro).

   Stuff to do. In the summer - tons. Check out the link here to see the varied activities available at the resort (we didn't see too much of this stuff, we were there in the winter/off-season). 
   The things that concern us are the kayak launch area at the marina docks - it looks great - and the trail system that connects the resort to nearby British camp and beyond. We plan to return to check out both the British & American camps on foot - a pretty extensive trail system makes it all happen. The other thing we somehow missed? The creepy - I mean interesting - mausoleum of the former Lime company founder from back in the day (read about it here…guess who's ashes are locked in the seats of the chairs?). Maybe we'll check it out at the summer solstice and see if the light on the table rumor is true…oh ya - by the way, there is a light on the table rumor...interesting.

   So much history! I'll admit - once I found out the town was actually a resort I almost wrote it off as, well, a made-up town that is just a resort (Seaside Florida anyone?). After reading up on the history behind the place I am officially blown away. I know we'll be back on foot and by kayak. You should go too!  Meet you at the mausoleum at solstice?
   ~Paul & Amber   ETC                                                                                    www.rocheharbor.com

   The club is in wintertime-research-mode - preparing for a multi-day San Juan Island adventure this summer (see our earlier post from the Islands). Our plan for now is to leave our car on the mainland and take a boat from Anacortes or Bellingham to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. I say boat because we may approach a few local charters and see if we can hitch a ride (that would be sweeeet). Taking the Washington state ferry is our other option - it's what we took last month when we set out to explore San Juan Island by car.

   The ferry ride from Anacortes to San Juan Island (where we want to start our summer adventure) takes just over an hour. We tested it out over Veterans Day weekend last month, leaving on a Sunday and coming back on Monday. We had no problem with crowds while getting on - we arrived about 10 minutes ahead of time and made it right on (I'm sure this wouldn't be the case in the summer). We noticed a nice parking lot here too - almost fenced in - probably not a bad place to leave a car (it costs $20 to leave it here for a week). The ferry ride costs about $50 (roundtrip fare to San Juan Island for car & two passengers). 
   The plan in the summer is to leave a car  on the mainland and head as passengers to Friday Harbor (on San Juan Island), take all of our gear with us (our Innova kayaks pack small) & paddle back, camping along the way back to the terminal & our car.

   Things we still need to figure out - what's it like to leave the car for a week or so at the ferry terminal? Is it safe? Would leaving it at the Bellingham marina be better? (we read of a passenger ferry that leaves Bellingham in the summer). Can we fit two kayaks plus all of our camping gear on us to walk on as passengers in the first place? Will people look at us like we're crazy when we walk on with giant packs full of kayaking goodies {yes they will - kinda like they did when we hiked to Lake Serene for a paddle}. Will they be jealous when they learn of our plans {yes}. Should we fly to the islands via seaplane from Seattle?

   Can we do it? {We must!} The planning continues...     ~Paul & Amber      ETC

P.S. A few links:
Cascadia Marine Trail from www.thesanjuans.com 
Washington Water Trails Association {we just joined to gain access to printable maps!}
Anacortes Ferry Terminal

   The preparations have begun! We've decided to start exploring the San Juan Islands, a little groundwork for an upcoming summer multi-day paddle (a.k.a. ETC paddles the San Juan Islands!).  We started by visiting the most populous and second largest of the islands - San Juan Island. It's the offseason - a perfect for time for exploration. We dined, stayed at a nice little hotel in Friday Harbor (review here), shopped, and crisscrossed the island looking for kayak put-ins and other interesting sites. While driving around to the west side of the island we stumbled upon Lime Kiln Point State Park. 

   Before we get into all that, a little about the islands. The San Juans are an archipelago in the NW corner of our state of Washington. They're kinda like cold water Virgin Islands - hilly, some close to each other, some far, some big, some small, some inhabited, some not, a great place for sailing and anchoring in protective coves.       
   They're boxed in by a bunch of straits - Juan de Fuca to the south, Haro to the west, Rosario to the east, and Boundary Pass (and eventually the Strait of Georgia) to the north. If you live in Seattle and have a boat (like us), the Shilshole to San Juan trip in the summer is the thing to do.

   Since we were visiting by land this time we took the car from Seattle north to Anacortes and ferried over to San Juan Island. We highly recommend checking the ferry schedule before you go, that is the trickiest part to getting here. I'm sure the summer ferries are packed…heck, we even left on a Monday afternoon and still almost missed the boat because it was crowded. Also, on your return, if your boat is coming from Canada and picking you up in Friday Harbor you'll have to go through a border crossing once you get to Anacortes (even though you didn't even leave the ol' USA). 
   We arrived at the town of Friday Harbor after about an hour boat ride. We drove right through and set out to explore the island. We saw signs for Lime Kiln Point State Park and decided to park and check the place out.

   We were glad we stopped! It was Veterans Day weekend so admission was free (otherwise you'd have to have a Discover Pass to park). We set off down the shoreline trail & explored the Lime Kiln Point lighthouse - a favorite destination for tourists & whale watchers (check the board up front for listings of the most recent whale sightings). It overlooks the Haro Strait and that's Canada in the distance!

   Then it gets interesting. Leave it to this guy to set out exploring Lime Kiln Point State Park without really knowing what a lime kiln is in the first place.  I do, however, follow directions pretty well and noticed the signs leading to the kiln. A loop trail connects the shoreline trail (lighthouse) to the upland trail (kiln).

   Holy lime kiln batman! Long story short - limestone is a rock & is partly formed of marine skeletons…yep, that's right…skeletons. Limestone can be baked down to pure lime.
   When you clearcut the forests of San Juan island, as they did back in the day, and stoke a super hot fire in a stone kiln (the tall stone thing in all of these pictures), you can heat limestone up to a point where it separates (from impurities and the other stuff it's made of).
   The separated pure lime from here was, in the early 1900s, some of the purest lime in the world…why did that matter? Well steel, among other things like plaster, cement, & paper are made using lime. Steel made from NW lime was actually used to rebuild buildings in San Francisco after their great earthquake/fire of 1906!
   So basically it was - mine the lime, transfer down to the top of the kiln with cable cars (sounds like a great Indiana Jones cable-car scene here), cut down almost every tree on the island, stoke the fire, bake & separate the lime, toss lime that didn't properly separate over your shoulder, move the lime into barrels onto boats & move onto nearby ships in Friday Harbor, then ship the product to warehouses in Seattle/Vancouver/Portland. Eventually some of this lime was then shipped south, made into steel, & used to rebuild San Fran…crazy NW fun-facts!

   That's not bird poo. No seriously, I thought it was bird poo. We have some giant birds and bird migrations in Washington and I thought they may have all congregated on this one rock. 
   Turns out that those historical workers we were talking about only liked to use a certain size of limestone. They broke it up, blew it up, and discarded the little sizes they couldn't use. Remember that unseparated limestone they tossed over their shoulders? To this day - lime leftovers are all over the place near the kiln (like the giant white rock pictured above).

   As you can see - Lime Kiln Point State Park is definitely worth the time. Downside? Well, if you came to San Juan Island as a passenger (to avoid the crowded summer car ferries) it would be quite a trek across the island to get to the park.
   Upsides? The shoreline and upland trails are pretty short and easy (although there is a little staircase of doom by the kiln), the sights are historic and amazing, there's a lighthouse, & you have a great chance to see some the orca pods cruising just off the point. Cool stuff.
   ~Paul & Amber   ETC

   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