We got married on Martha’s Vineyard in February, 2010, hours before running one of our favorite races, the Martha’s Vineyard 20 miler. Mike has family on Cape Cod and we try to visit at least once a year. While there, we love taking the ferry over to Martha’s Vineyard, and even took the ferry over to Nantucket with our bicycles one memorable summer day before we had the boys.
I have strong, happy feelings about islands. Taking a ferry, walking or driving off into a town full of shops and people who are going about their lives on an island -so far from the rest of the world, yet getting on just like the rest of the world. Needless to say, I was really excited to walk into the Anacortes, WA ferry terminal and purchase four round-trip tickets to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island on Tuesday morning.
There are three islands in the Salish Sea that we could ferry to from Anacortes: our choices were San Juan Island, Orcas Island, and Lopez Island. We chose Friday Harbor in San Juan based largely on the ferry departure time.
The first of MANY highlights of my day was that my bill for round trip fair for four to Friday Harbor on San Juan Island from Anacortes, WA, was $31 and change. The round-trip fare to San Juan Island for a walk-on passenger is a little over $15, and children 12 and under ride for free. Umm…that’s a really great deal.
We went into the day with absolutely no expectations, and completely ignorant to anything Friday Harbor and San Juan Island had to offer. When we boarded the 9:05 am ferry, we didn’t even know what the return ferry schedule was for the day! We just knew that we did have round-trip tickets, and trusted that at some point we would return to the truck in the parking lot of the Anacortes ferry terminal.
The ferry boat was spacious with a cafe on the first floor. The boys got a kick out of buying their breakfast on the ship, and I took advantage of the loads of free publications on board, especially one geared toward adventures on the Oregon Coast (which was in our future) and another about all things Yellowstone National Park (also in our future). Ironically there was zero literature on board about San Juan Island. So when we walked off the ferry and into downtown Friday Harbor, we still had absolutely no idea what we were getting into.
After some “umm…”-ing and “well….”-ing…we made our way to the Visitor’s Center where a very friendly person offered us help in reading the return ferry schedule and gave us a few options for how to explore the island without a vehicle. Our family quickly decided that it was the Friday Harbor Trolley for the win! We bought four tickets – $25 each – and set out on the 11:30 island tour.
The trolly is set up as a hop on and off at your leisure experience. Of the five designated stops on the trip around the island, our crew decided we’d stop at the San Juan Island Sculpture Park and walk to the Roache Harbor (another stop) and hop back on the trolley, where we’d ride until taking another hour-long break at the Lime Kiln State Park in hopes of seeing orcas we were told frequent that part of the island, and also to hike out to the Lime Kiln Lighthouse.
Our first stop at the Sculpture Park gave us a beautiful place to appreciate the art AND enjoy the picnic lunch we’d brought along. It was a short five-minute walk down to Roache Harbor from the sculpture garden, and the water and boats and blue skies were idyllic. We hopped into the LIme Kiln Tavern in hopes of snagging some of their homemade donuts we’d heard so much about on island, but sadly they were sold out for the day. We did grab some postcard stamps at the harbor’s post office, though, and had a lovely chat with the postmaster.
The Lime Kiln State Park that houses the Lime Kiln Lighthouse offered an easy, scenic hike from the whale watching area (no luck for us in spying any orcas that afternoon) to the lighthouse. We could see Vancouver Canada across the water, and seeing as our cell phone provider charged us a $5 international use fee, we must have been pretty darn close, ha!
The trolley ride itself was comfortable, educational, and a lot of fun! The drivers pointed out island highlights and offered all kinds of historical facts and current-day demographic information about the island. Each of the stops also included a short video that the driver would play just before reaching the site that offered all kinds of interesting information about that specific place on the island. The entire ride is 90 minutes long if you don’t hop off anywhere, and at $25 per rider, it was a really cost-effective and entertaining way to see the whole island without a vehicle in my opinion.
The island also offered a public transit bus option that allowed you to pay for fares from town to town. You could also rent mopeds, or a two-seater Scoot Coupe (they were adorable!). Mike better watch out, because we’re headed for a Scoot Coupe tour if we ever visit any of the San Juan Islands in our empty nesting years!
We got back to Friday Harbor at 3:30 and had a big decision to make – because it was a weekday, our return options were 3:40 (hustle, hustle) or 6:30 (what will we do until 6:30?). We had to drive 4 1/2 hours to Packwood, Washington the next day for our next stop at Mount Rainier. We had a 75-minute drive from Anacortes to Rockport after the hour-long ferry ride. We knew we should hop on that 3:40 ferry…
But we did not.
And I’m so glad we didn’t! We window shopped, and actually shopped (hello, book store!), and ate dinner outside on the water, and enjoyed an ice cream cone while we waited for our 6:30 pm return ferry. Blue sky island days in the Pacific Northwest don’t come along often (once in 43 years in my experience), and there is pretty close to no reason at all to rush them. Ahhh. It was lovely.
We spent as much time on the outside deck as we could bear (brrr) on our return trip, bid Friday Harbor, looking for wildlife and enjoying the stunning view of Mount Baker in the distance. In just a little over an hour of ferry time, we bid Anacortes goodbye, and headed back to Rockport, spotting too many elk to count on our drive back to our campsite. It was a fantastic day, and even though we got just as many steps in (possibly more) than a typical heavy hiking day, the change of pace renewed everyone’s National Park adventuring spirit just in time for us to move onto Mount Rainier, where we had our sights set on what we assumed would be the longest, most difficult hike of our entire trip: the Skyline trail.
To Mount Rainier!
