The Last Port Angeles Trip - Part 1

Pictures now. Bed next. Captions tomorrow.

*EDIT* Captions added.

Up early and onto the MV Coho, on our way to Canada.

Just me and my lady.

A lot of seaplanes fly in and out of Victoria everyday. I really like the idea of seaplanes and the whole thing evokes a sense of romance that is missing in traveling these days. Of course I can't afford it, so much for that.

Dragon races for cancer.

Totem pole outside of the Royal BC Museum. I case you don't already know, I really love Pac-NW native art, totems especially.

Inside the museum and Michele found something she likes.

Fixie locked up in the old timey town, notice that it's locked up by the seat. Classy.

The stairs to the carillon, the bells played a short little tune every hour or so and a longer performance sometime later in the day(we missed it).

Oh yes I was.

Michele wants me to hurry up, can you sense that in the photo?

Hi ya!

During our short little jaunt out the Galloping Goose Trail we passed this shop that looks like it has some potential.

Mural on the trail.

The other side.

Ahh yes, my lovely bicycle.

Short but cool little run through the trees.

Stopped for lunch at Spinnakers, a restaurant, brewery, and hotel reminiscent of McMenamins.

From our seats we could watch our boat leave.

Beer and truffle pairings? Oh what the hell, I think I might be able to choke that down.

The day ended with a visit to the nearly closed Maritime Museum($10 for 10 minutes? No thanks.) and a little bookstore shopping. Rather than wait for a long time to catch the Coho we left earlier, picking up a seat on the Victoria Express. The V.E. is a faster, smaller, and slightly cheaper passenger only ferry covering the same route as the Coho. We were back on dry land and through customs with plenty of light left in the day, which leads us into part 2.

Leaving Seattle at 21 MPH

Yesterday I planned my work day around a decent Seattle departure. I had a 15 minute task that needed to be done at the Stimson-Green mansion on first hill before the end of the day and so I timed it out so that the buzzer would go off there and then it's just a short hop. skip, and jump from the Bainbridge Island ferry. Even though it still took me four hours to get to PA, it was much better than the cluster fuck that I was up against two weeks ago in Edmunds. The cool thing about the Bainbridge ferry is that it's a true commuter ferry, both the passenger deck and the sundeck were packed with people, it really felt like the giant bus that it is.

Hauling ass. I picked up a couple of hitchers also headed to PA on the way off the ferry, it was nice to have a little company for the last hour of my journey. They were a couple of girls coming from Southern Oregon on their way to Victoria. Both were dumb as rocks and a little weird, but nice enough.

After dropping my passengers at the ferry terminal I headed up to Michele's placde because I was ready for some dinner, and so was my lady. We hopped on our bicycles for the one mile journey down town. Michele on her Smoke and me on the El M.(in commuter mode) we made good time and I got some nice in motion pictures of my lady with the big camera.

How can you not love that big toothy grin? Tomorrow we've got a big day planned(hence the El M. w/ slicks), I'm excited and so is Michele.

Totally Bad Ass

Photo blatently stolen from the dark depths of the interweb. Is he gonna bite it or no? I can't decide.

Mo Money

We got two letters in the mail today from Michele's school. The first was asking us to start paying them some money. The other was begging for it.

Oh, You Brought THAT Bike!

That was what she said when I pulled The Bike Formerly Known as Unit out of the E. What the fuck does that mean anyway? True, The El M. has been my go to bike more often than not for the majority of the riding I've done this year, but that doesn't mean I've forgotten TBFKaU. I love this bike, and Miller Peninsula is a great place to take it for a ride.

Miller Peninsula is a good place for singlespeeding, It doesn't have any sustained climbs(elevation never gets over 400ft) and has some mild tech if you seek it out(we didn't).

Michele seemed to be enjoying herself although she wasn't looking forward to the return from the beach. The climb turned out to not be a problem, Michele killed it and I walked the start as not to waste my legs. I should have just sucked it up and ridden it.

Beach adjacent bike parking.

Not the greatest beach I've ever been to but since it's remote and bike, horse, and foot access only it earns a few extra points in my book.

My favorite part of this particular ride was cruising back down the doubletrack with Michele at around 14 mph.

And here she is!

About 8 miles and 1000 ft total, not bad for a quickie S & M ride.

Last One On

Holy shit it took a long time to get here yesterday. Nearly 4 1/2 hours to travel all of 62 miles. Even with rush hour traffic I think I'd have made better time crossing at Tacoma Narrows.

The vast majority of my time was spent waiting for the boat. I ended up riding the Walla Walla on a route that is normally serviced by the Spokane and the Puyallup, interesting. I was literally the last car loaded. I would have been pissed if I missed out on that boat.

At least I got to wake up to this view this morning. Good stuff.

Blue Angels