I headed up north to the San Juan island of Lopez with a friend for the day. We left our car in Anacortes for the day and went for a lovely ferry ride with our bikes in toe. Although the ferry was late and we were both not ready for the amount of hills we experienced during our bike trip, the day was well worth it.
From the minute we got off at Lopez, I felt as though we had been transported into some past land since the entire island had an old school country feel to it.
We headed to a state park where our kayaking adventure departed. Riding through the area was grand because of the large fields, rarely traveled upon roads and pastoral views.
During the kayak tour we saw lots of great scenery, learned about the area’s history and got our paddling on. The state park had a beautiful spit, colorful marshland and a beach area!
We enjoyed a nice afternoon snack on the beach with incredible views before biking back across the island.
While waiting for our ferry back, we explored a lovely Ferry Garden (get it? Fairy Garden?) and stopped for some lunch at a hot dog shop at the ferry terminal. I thought there would be more services available on the island, but it was much more remote than I was expected. I guess it makes sense there wouldn’t be a ton of variety for an island that boasts a population of just over 2,000 people.
On our way back, there were basically more bikes on board than cars, which I thought was truly epic and very European of all of us. We also contributed to the ferry system by doing what we could to help complete one of the puzzles left on board at one of the tables.
On our drive home, we stopped to admire the beautiful sunset we saw along the way before considering our weekend adventure a success!
Maybe one day I will live in a place where I can just bike around to wherever I want, but until then I will have to settle for day trips to Lopez Island. It was so much fun!
