August, 2020
You’ll remember in the last blog post here that I walked the trail/boardwalk through the marshland to the far end of the trail (near the ferry terminal). In THIS blog post, I walk back to the big white truck, but I don’t return using the same trail/boardwalk. Instead, as promised, I scramble down onto the sandy beach and walk back that way, on the beach. Let’s go!
In the photo above, I’m down on the beach. I’m looking at vehicle traffic on the left side of the photo (ready to board the next ferry) … and the large ferry terminal built out over the water is on the right side of the photo … and you can see a large number of pilings and the remains of concrete structures in the water. I’ll walk up and explore those pilings and concrete in just a moment … but first …
Just a few minutes after I set foot on the beach, one of the large ferries (the M/V Samish) pulled away from the dock, heading towards all of its scheduled stops in the San Juan Islands. In the video below, you’ll see the ferry pull out, then turn to port (left) and head towards Thatcher Pass, between Decatur Island and Blakely Island, and thence in amongst the San Juans.
You’ll also see what a grey, foggy morning this was. Not to worry though, the ferry crew had plenty of visibility and these ferries have multiple/redundant radar systems on board.
That was fun to see the M/V Samish leave the dock. I thought it was excellent that the Samish is part of the San Juans/Anacortes ferry system, plying the waters where the Samish people lived for thousands of years.
And then, a mere 15 minutes later, the clouds began to lift, a spot of blue sky appeared here and there, and a different ferry came around the corner inbound to the ferry terminal. This ferry was the M/V Chelan, arriving at the Anacortes ferry terminal after its scheduled sojourn through the San Juans.
Interesting numbers on the pilings above. It seemed that every piling with a bird house was assigned a number. I wondered if the birds in residence there received their mail that way … and paid rent based on location and amenities and how nice their view was. 🙂
All of these pilings and all of these concrete structures are remnants of the canneries and docks that were here years ago. The Fidalgo Island Packing Company was opened in 1894 … that’s how old some of these structures and pilings are! Read that year correctly … it’s not 1984 … it’s 1894.
A hundred yards or so further down the beach, there was a second group of pilings … also with numbered bird houses.
These rock formations (in photos above and below) didn’t exist anywhere on the beach except at the head of each conglomeration of pilings and concrete structures. In addition to their location, the fact that these formations seemed to be rusting made me think they were tailings from the construction of the original cannery structures, or possibly scrap metal that was dumped and was a result of manufacturing of the cans used in the cannery.
A bit further down the beach was another set of pilings, but they had been built at an angle to the beach … not straight out from the beach like the other larger groups of pilings. Surely these were once a dock of some sort.
An interesting lump of sand, surrounded by seaweed.
Many types of seaweed are edible, and delicious. I wondered about the seaweed in the photo above.
And then, even further down the beach, almost back to the parking area where my big white truck was, this feathered person (above) was determinedly heading the same direction I was. She seemed to be saying, “let’s get back to that truck, I’m hungry for lunch!”
I agreed!
Just past the tree trunk/branch that overhangs the beach in the photo above, I clambered back up over some rip-rap boulders to the parking lot and the truck, then drove back to my campsite for lunch. What a great morning … an Osprey, flowers, ferry boats, sunshine, Teasel plants, and a perfect Pacific Northwest beach.
Ok, here’s just one last video look at this saltwater beach. The wavelets splashing up on the beach weren’t really waves from the ocean since we’re too far inland here, with too many islands in between this location and the real ocean. And there wasn’t a breath of wind to stir up waves. Those little waves are from the wakes of passing boats. Had it not been for boat traffic (there sure wasn’t much of that here this day), the water would have been absolutely flat calm. In fact, in all my years of boating in these very same exact waters, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it this calm here. Indeed, a superior morning. 🙂