July 8 and 9 - Heading to Alaska

Thursday July 8, The Adventure Begins: We stepped out of the Seattle/Tacoma airport into 90 degree heat. The Colorado Front Range and the Seattle area seemed to have traded their typical weather patterns. So weird! Our shuttle north to Bellingham wound through downtown briefly, and we glimpsed a few notable things – a very full ball park - Mariners playing the Yankees, the familiar big red Pike Place market signs down toward the waterfront and at dusk, the dark silhouette of the Space Needle, best glimpsed from the freeway as we headed north out of the city and on our way up the coast to Bellingham.

Friday July 9, Hanging out in Bellingham: Bellingham is most definitely not a Seattle suburb, but its own place with a thriving downtown hosting plenty of funky stores. We had the better part of a day to hang out, and the heat and sun stayed with us. Our cheap motel didn’t want to keep our duffel bags for the day, but the friendly front desk guy at the Coachman Inn next door happily helped us out. If you go to Bellingham, stay at the Coachman! Bellingham has an excellent brewpub, a city park with a salmon hatchery (already empty in July) and lovely botanical exhibits. I picked some ripe thimbleberries and handed them to Fei – one of her school research subjects suddenly came to life - delicious!

Toward 4 PM, we got a taxi to the Alaskan Marine Highway Ferry terminal and boarded the Columbia. We chucked the luggage in our tiny port side 4 bed cabin and headed for the open decks on the stern to study the vehicles being loaded. Lots of trucks with campers, a few semis, a dozen or so Harleys, trucks hauling fishing boats and every style of camping rig you can imagine. On the ship’s stern, 20 or 30 tents were already set up and duct taped to the deck. All of the lounge chairs in the warm solarium were claimed with sleeping bags, pillows and bags of food. Mark and Pete set up the tent we’d brought along and went begging for duct tape.

Soon, the ship’s horn boomed and we moved out from the terminal, with Bellingham quickly disappearing behind the contours of the complicated coastline. The tent didn’t pan out – the wind came up and quickly tore loose one corner. Why fuss over it when we can all fit in a warm, dry cabin?