Weekend in Winthrop

It was a pretty warm day on Friday with beautiful blue skies. We pulled the kids out of school at midday, packed the car and left for the border. Radio reports said that the closest crossings had delays of up to one hour so we headed for the Huntington/Sumas crossing and followed Highway 9 down to Sedro-Wooley. From here we joined Highway 20 for the crossing over Washington Pass.

This is an amazing drive. We drove inland along the Skagit Valley to Concrete, Rockport, and Marblemount. From here the road starts to climb towards Newhalem, which is where much of Seattle's power is generated. There is a series of three dams on the river, all within a few a few miles of each other. There is an overlook at the Gorge Dam with vies up the valley, and Gorge Falls which brings snowmelt down to the dam. Further up above Diablo Lake there is another viewpoint with fantastic vies of the lake, valleys, and snowcapped mountains.

Each bend in the road brings amazing vistas of mountains, trees, waterfalls, valleys, and fast flowing rivers and streams. It is sometimes difficult to keep your eyes on the road as the scenery is breathtaking. You can't pass a viewpoint, or pullout, without stopping to take in the view.

We had made arrangements to call Carol and Terry when we got close to Winthrop. They live about 15 minutes drive out of town, and would come in and guide us. There was no phone reception in the mountains and we kept checking as we got closer to town. It wasn't until we were about 5 km out of town that we actually got reception. Bridget rang Carol at home, who thought that it was her daughter. Terry was waiting for us at the Big Red Barn, which was on the outskirts of town. It had been just over 7 years since we had seen him. He hadn't changed much - except maybe he is letting his hair grow a bit longer. The kids jumped in with him and we followed him through town and up into the nearby hills, winding our way along gravel roads, through valleys and around hills until we pulled into a gravel drive towards a house sitting on the upper slopes of a hill with fantastic views down the valleys and towards the snow capped peaks in the distance. The day had been warm. It had reached about 97 F on this side of the mountains.

Carol greeted us and we went inside for a quick tour of the house and taking in the views before sitting down to a tuna burrito dinner and a few drinks. There were bluebirds darting in and out of bird boxes on either end of the decking, lots of wildflowers, the odd chipmunk, and the sound of woodpeckers in the distance. We watched the sun go down and the mountains became silhouettes against the evening sky. I said that sunrise here would be magic, and Bridget said that she would get up to see it. She woke me at about 4:45 am while the sun was starting to brighten the dawn. The birds were chirping and darting in and out of their boxes and everthing started to emerge from the shadows of the night. We sat there and snapped photos as we watched the birds and the day dawning. I then headed back to bed for a few more hours sleep.

Saturday was the local Farmer's Market in Twisp, so we headed off to expolre the market and look for bargains. It is very Western around here, and some of the locals look like they have just been an "Extra" and just stepped out of a western movie, or a tale of the gold rush era. We found a few treasures including an original Stetson hat for Daniel. We headed back to the house for lunch, but not before stopping in at the local supermarket for supplies and a few photos. The owner of the store has his trophies mounted and displayed above the freezers in the middle of the store. There are all sorts of animals from North America as well as some from Africa. I was told that he has just come back from a safari with a lion and two elephants. I didn't think you could still hunt them.

After lunch we went for a drive to the nearby Sun Mountain Lodge. It has amazing views of the mountains and valleys. In winter it is surrounded by about 250 miles of groomed trails for skiing. In summer there are hiking trails, horses, bike riding, river rafting, and a variety of other outdoor pursuits. It looked very inviting in the pool.

We headed into Winthrop and walked around on the wooden sidewalks under wooden verandahs that conjure up thoughts of the western towns of the movies and television. We stopped and had an icecream, which was very refreshing. I like berry icecreams and decided to taste huckleberry flavour, which was good. Terry had heard from the locals that the rattlesnakes were active, and that someone had counted about 36 along the side of the road as he was driving the other day. They said that you could hear them as you drove. We drove towards the area, not knowing whether we wanted to find any, or not. As it turned out we didn't find any, but we did get some great views as we drove.

We had made arrangements to Skype friends back in Australia. Robert and Leanne had been neighbours in Geelong, and had looked after, and become friends with Carol and Terry. They had spoken over the phone since, but not seen each other. We installed Skype on their computer and had a great conversation. Bridget and Daniel showed Terry a few other things on the computer, including Twitter. I think that a whole new "social networking" world has been opened.

On Sunday we got up to another warm, but slightly overcast morning. We had breakfast, packed our bags, said our goodbyes, and headed back to Highway 20 for the reverse trip back over The Cascade Mountains. The views are just as magnificent in reverse. The climb to Washington Pass goes up a huge U-shaped valley that has been carved out by glaciers, and heads towards a magnificently rugged looking Liberty Bell. Again we stopped at almost every viewpoint and ended up by having a lat afternoon lunch on the Skagit River at Rockport.

We called in on friends in Burlington and headed back towards the border and home. This time we headed for the Peace Arch crossing and I was surprised to be able to drive right up to the Customs booth at the border without any wait, or queue.