I have been jonesing for locally-sourced sausage here in the gigantic beef, pork and dairy Mecca of the Lower Skagit Valley. Accordingly, I probably searched unwisely and we ended up at a place called Haggen’s which is like a Whole Foods except pricier. Their cheese and sausage selections were vast, as were their prices. We snagged some of their meat but got out for less than $100.00. That was surprising.
Today we spent quite a bit of time on the phone trying to get our future RV park scheduling squared away. We cancelled our stay at nearby Friday Creek (see yesterday’s blog) and started calling all over NW Washington for replacement locations for the three weeks we are NOT going to spend in Friday Creek.
It seems that RV spaces in this part of Washington are in great demand and very popular with the RV crowd, particularly on weekends in the summer. Nevertheless, after only a few miserable hours on hold and waiting for folks to answer their phones, we were able to get spaces for every cancelled day except one, which we hope to spend boondocking up the Skagit River near Baker Lake. I’m glad we have generators, on-board water and waste tanks, a satellite TV antenna and a couple guns because we will be roughing it outside our normal comfort zone.
Today was a chore day. It was quite boring. We scheduled a honey wagon visit. Peggy did some shopping in Costco, re-provisioning out freezer and cabinets, particularly the liquor cabinet. I took the truck to Les Schwab to have an errant Phillips-head screw extracted from the tread of our almost-new front left tire. They had a sophisticated removal method extracting the screw out by grasping the head in a pair of side cutters and yanking. They checked whether the screw created a leak by putting a finger over the hole and declaring, “I don’t feel nothing” and “Looks okay!” before indicating I should move along. Peggy got to go to JoAnn Fabrics where she acquired some sewing and crocheting stuff. She came out of the store with a big grin and a bag of loot. I went to Harbor Freight to buy a vibratory cutting tool that I already own but which is safely ensconced in my garage at home. I was unable to find or buy any tool of that type because the folks in the Burlington store have never heard of such a device and do not sell them. I mentioned to them that I have purchased such a tool from the El Cajon, CA, store but they still insisted that such a tool was imaginary and unavailable there. I left, dejected.
We also took a spin to a little sub-campground of Mount Vernon TT called Friday Creek. On Google Earth the place looked okay but we thought we should give it a sniff because we are scheduled to stay there for a few weeks in August. The direct route between these adjoining campgrounds is quite short, easy to drive and currently blocked by road construction. We took about a ten mile detour and found our way to Friday Creek, which turned out to be quite unsuitable for our rig. It also claims partial hookups, no WiFi and no satellite reception in addition to unreliable cell service. We will need to rejigger our upcoming schedule because neither of us really want to stay there, particularly for three weeks.
It was moving day again so we saddled up at La Conner Marina RV and headed out on the highway. Our entire odyssey of driving today was 17 miles of straightforward rural roads, WA-20 and I-5. Just north of the WA-20 / I-5 interchange, we pulled off the interstate on Bow Hill Road. Shortly thereafter, we were registering at the Mount Vernon Thousand Trails campground which is only two cities away from the city of Mount Vernon. The campground is actually in a zip code called Bow. This morning’s drive was so short that we arrived prior to the posted earliest check-in time but the staff seemed unaware of the rule and they signed us in.
Perhaps arriving a bit early was a good thing, in this case. We were able to drive directly to a recently vacated but still warm RV space that is quite spacious, quiet and with a gentle grass slope on one side of our trailer and dense brush 12 feet away on the other.
The brush is loaded with creatures. I spotted a hummingbird, Black-headed Grosbeaks, Western Tanagers, Spotted Towhees, Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Steller’s Jays and some high-speed Yellow Warblers, tiny but cute chipmunks, marauding squirrels and cottontail rabbits just wandering around outside the trailer. We enticed these animals to hang around more by putting a bird feeder outside. Unfortunately, the squirrels are quite clever and have found a way to hang upside down from the support hook and dine from the feeder at will. I think they are getting a greater share of the contents than the birds are.
See some critter pix. Click the link. https://photos.app.goo.gl/Rh7zGCmfakVU8JNf9
We consulted the campground hostess this morning in an attempt to find the facility laundromat. It turns out that there are two laundry buildings within the La Conner Marina but not inside our park. Today was our last full day in La Conner, at least for this visit. We celebrated by doing the laundry which had grown to leviathan proportions since we last hit the washateria.
Except for a brain fart by me that increased our time commitment to this essential task, we were out of the laundry by early afternoon. That is primarily because I didn’t help Peggy, who did most of the work. It turns out that having two people on the chore, when I am one of them, does not increase efficiency nor reduce the amount of time required to finish. Funny.
We took a last little drive around La Conner and over onto the Swinomish Reservation this afternoon. We spotted a big kiddie slide shaped like a giant salmon. We found a massive pink steel single truss arch bridge. On the Swinomish side of the channel we found some gorgeous places and buildings there although there is a little section down near the water where there are some ugly tribal reservation subsidized houses. Not many folks live here but we could see they all liked their fireworks because there were piles of empty fireworks packaging in big heaps, ready for trash pickup. The streets were completely littered with little scraps of paper that used to be the casings of firecrackers. I’ll bet these folks have more in their houses.
We picked up some inexpensive diesel on the Rez, probably due to their sovereign nature which eliminates pesky federal and state fuel taxes. We returned to our trailer late in the afternoon to find a group of three bright yellow goldfinches hanging out at our bird feeder. The goldfinch is the Washington State Bird and they are quite pretty guys.
There may even be a picture of one. Click the link. https://photos.app.goo.gl/7Rdt2tuodB3HdXjg7
Last night there were colorful displays and loud booms until about 0230 when things calmed to to only an occasional pop. We have good internet here so today we got quite a bit of Endevour up on our TV.
The La Conner Marina RV Park, where we are currently camped, is a nice little park with full hookups and WiFi but we still have not found the laundromat although we have scoped out all the buildings within the confines of the park’s fencing. Our truck cannot be parked near our trailer within the park but, according to the campground host, we are able to park across the street in a La Conner Marina Permit Parking lot. We have no permit. I hope the campground host ain’t pulling my leg.
We made a small foray from the park, in search of locally-produced food. Our first stop was at Black Rock Seafoods, across the Swinomish Channel and beyond the Swinomish Nation Reservation lands. Peggy and I have been there during previous visits because we have always been able to purchase great fish and clams at this great store. It is located in some guy’s yard; you can park right in front of the sliding glass door to the retail portion of his house. Two pretty girls got us all squared away with cod, scallops and clams before we left.
Next we went on a search for handmade cheese and we found some about 15 miles away near Edison at a place called Golden Glen Creamery. They don’t call it a dairy because the cheese costs less at a dairy. Anyway, we found some curds, some sweet basil cheese, some Feta, a block of fresh butter and some river cheddar. It was after we paid that we noted they don’t post the prices where consumers can see them because they would be frightened away. We ended up with five small items and $35 less.
We took all our loot home and found that the Swinomish across the channel have not exhausted their fireworks supply and were still in the spiffy lighting and booming business. They quit before midnight so it was okay.
Today is the 4th of July and we believed we had identified an ideal location to watch tonight’s municipal fireworks show. They are launched from the La Conner Marina. There seemed little reason to go anywhere today because we were already where we needed to be – right here in the La Conner Marina RV Park. Nevertheless, parking looked like it wasn’t going to be scarce as the showtime approached so we did pop into the town of La Conner for a quick leer.
Downtown was about as busy as a tiny town could be. Lots of tourists just like us were creeping along the two downtown streets perusing the myriad shops, quite a few of which were clearly oriented toward selling nifty, upscale home furnishing items to affluent perambulators. Most of the businesses were open despite it being a holiday. Even the local overpriced grocery store was open and we bought some mozzarella for tonight’s lasagna.
We made a few passes by La Conner’s residences close to downtown and found a really handsome assortment of beautiful wood-framed structures, almost all of them with intricate wood gingerbread. There are also lots of interesting public art sculptures dotting the sidewalks. Downtown was definitely work a look.
We returned to our trailer, made and consumed probably more lasagna than was prudent. Soon, fireworks owned by the locals started to light up the sky. Fireworks sales are legal in Washington but the places where they can be set off is a bit nebulous. As it happens, La Conner is directly across the Swinomish Channel from the Swinomish Reservation and the folks over there were all amply supplied with very impressive fireworks and not confused about where they can be fired off. Fireworks retail outlets are ubiquitous. Peggy and I set up our folding chairs at the edge of our RV park, overlooking a stage with live bands, a beer garden, a booth with kettle corn and the municipal fireworks launch area. The Swinomish Nation, across the channel, who were all amply supplied with myriad dangerous types of fireworks, began their festivities before dark. They were so well supplied that it looked like some of the opposite shoreline was former fireworks storage and manufacturing facilities that had all caught fire.
Artificial lighting was absolutely unnecessary anywhere near the channel for the next three hours. Aerial bombs kept all of the elderly jumping. At 10:00 PM, the town of La Conner started their show right in front of our seating but, since it occurred in the middle of a sustained barrage from across the water, it could have been left out and nobody would have known. Those Native Americans across the channel really know how to celebrate the 4th.
We might make special arrangements to be here again on one of the 4ths in the future.
We got a few pix. Click the link. https://photos.app.goo.gl/cHS2e8NTCaLoWPRW9
This morning, as we prepared to depart from Grandy Creek TT in Concrete, RV sharks were skulking about our trailer space. They had noted that our prominently displayed registration form clearly showed our departure date as today and, By God!, they were going to have our little gravel driveway. Some hid behind vegetation with their massive RV’s, their passengers peering around the thicket edges to see if we were on our way out. Others circled in a crazy musical chairs game, hoping to be in the exact right spot once we hooked up, shifted into drive and stepped on the accelerator. Our RV space for the last ten days was ultimately claimed by a skinny, expensive-looking shrew and her gormless worm male counterpart who, yesterday, had explained to me all the rules regarding not saving spaces for anybody other than them and how they were the most deserving to replace us when we left. She did most of the talking; he mostly nodded, looked morose and mumbled falsehoods that TT had overbooked the park. It seems that Grandy Creek is quite popular in the summer, particularly during weekends and this is 4th of July weekend.
We would love to return to Grandy Creek for a three week visit again this summer but I was clumsy and tardy pursuing our reservations and the only consecutive blocks of days we can get there in the near future are limited to stays of Monday to Friday, only, through the end of August. We will probably be in another part of the world by then. I will try to be sharper next time. Grandy Creek is a very pretty campground, it has full hookups, phones work, there is WiFi available, there are good restaurants and expensive shopping nearby, spaces are ample and the place is surrounded by extraordinary scenery.
From Grandy Creek we jumped onto WA-20 westbound and headed down the Skagit River through Sedro Woolley and Burlington before emerging on the west side of I-5. Shortly thereafter, we turned southwest on some two-lane farm roads until we pulled into La Conner. There is a Thousand Trails campground there but, since we don’t like that campground and the place was booked, we chose instead to stay at the La Conner Marina RV Park. It costs $39 a night and TT would have been free but we prefer the marina. Best of all, tomorrow the 4th of July fireworks are to be fired from, you guessed it, the La Conner Marina. We won’t be driving anywhere to see the show.
This small park (68 spaces) has full hookups, decent sized diagonal parallel spaces with little strips of nearly dead grass between them, great satellite TV reception, an alleged laundry which we have been unable to find, a truly extraordinary assortment of nearby girl-delighting shopping venues and it is fairly quiet although many of the guys towing boats around the marina on the adjacent roads seem to have faulty mufflers. I sure it will quiet down tonight but I think that tomorrow night sleeping might be problematic.
The weather turned rainy and much cooler today but we were undaunted. After our morning rituals, we hopped in the truck for a last run (for this particular stay) along both sides of the lower Skagit River. Our first stop was the Skagit Trust wildlife observation siding just east of our campground but there were no critters other than some bicyclists (which may not be critters at all) and one broken down old car abandoned in the parking lot. We didn’t take long to figure out we should continue, despite our fuddled old brains.
Only about a mile further east, we turned south, crossed the river and headed back west down the south bank of the Skagit River. There is a serious temperate rain forest here – the trees on each side of the road branch out and create a magnificent green, shady canopy over the highway. We spotted quite a few deer along this stretch, some happily harvesting the low-hanging apples, apparently guilt free, in the residents’ front yards.
The gorgeous turquoise waters of the river were to our right, abundant creeks and small waterfalls to our left. This might be one of the prettiest drives in the world – right up there with Colorado 12 near Trinidad and the valley floor at Yosemite.
We continued downriver to the town of Sedro Woolley where we crossed the river back to the north bank. We were going to eat at Skagit Valley Burgers there but the joint is closed on Tuesdays so we quickly formulated alternate eating arrangements. It was not difficult.
We found excellent scenery along the roads closest to the riverbank all the way back to Concrete, again stopping at the observation siding but found only vultures there. The Skagit Trust mowed the enormous field visible from the siding during the last few days and, apparently, lots of little squirrels, voles, chipmunks and other rat-sized creatures were chopped up by the mower, leaving the local vultures an easy feast. We continued up to Annie’s Pizza in town where, again, we purchased and partially devoured another superb cordon bleu pizza.
On the way back from Annie’s to our campground, we stopped for a third time at the observation siding and this time found a big, healthy bald eagle hanging out on the ground with some tiny beasts or chunks of beasts in his talons. He was calling for his mate who must have been over at the river fishing because she never showed. Eventually, the vultures got some of his loot, probably because they outnumbered him about 20 to 1. He did fly off with a substantial hunk but a lot less than he had before.
We took a few pictures along the way. See them by clicking the link. https://photos.app.goo.gl/M2VdB2fNLgs43ayg7
We don’t seem to be able to get out of the campground lately. Today the only thing we did other than rustle up some meals and listen to the wind in the trees was to identify a miscreant in our campground who was driving way too fast. During our lounging outside in the gorgeous weather and gentle breeze, we noted the gobshite spinning his back wheels and hurling the gravel road into the air while leaving the campground with his boat.
The posted speed in the campground is 5 mph. The campground staff estimated his speed at 50 which he maintained until he drove over one of the ubiquitous speed bumps, causing either his truck or his boat to make a nasty clunk. Everybody watching him was initially horrified but soon laughing after hearing the expensive noise made when he and his boat went airborne. Unfortunately, it didn’t slow him down and he blasted out of the normally serene setting with much tire squealing and dust. Soon afterwards, campground staff came around to see if anybody could identify where the jerk was camped and, unfortunately for him, I could.
Thousand Trails usually doesn’t do much in the way of rule enforcement but this peckerwood drew quite a bit of scrutiny and all were happy to hear that he will be fined and evicted. Tragic, eh?