While we’ve nearly exhausted our tourist time, we did manage to fit in a nice day of driving by heading down the length of Whidbey Island, just North of Seattle.
But on the way, we had to visit the Fremont Troll, since it was so close and we barely missed it on our Duck ride the other day. Luckily it was indeed on our way, and we simply stopped for a few minutes and checked out the massive sculpture. Very cool.
Then we hit the road, and took I-5 towards Vancouver, veering off to Anacortes before we made it quite that far. Unfortunately, the ferries were not cooperating, so we decided to drive some more. We had hoped to take a ferry out towards the San Juan Islands, but it just was not to be on this day.
We caught a beautiful view at the bridge over Deception Pass, but took a pass on the State Park because they wanted $5 for parking. While $5 isn’t a lot, it just seemed like too much for us to park for a few minutes, especially when we had just caught the view from the bridge.
So we drove down the rest of Whidbey Island and ended up at the Beachfire Grill, nestled in the Holmes Harbor Club in Freeland, on the South end of the island. The view was awesome, the weather was beautiful, and the food was not only tasty, it was well-priced. I highly recommend the Smoked Salmon Quesadilla. Very tasty.
A short wait we rode the ferry from Clinton to Mukilteo and then back to Seattle on Highway 99. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve always loved the Washington State Ferries. I think it’s because you can get out and wander around, even stand with your face in the wind and just take in the scenery. It was definitely a nice ride, and we didn’t have to wait long for it. When we hit Mukilteo, though, we saw the line of people waiting to get on the ferry back to Clinton – there had to be a 2 hour wait. Blech.
After a quick rest, we went to Kidd Valley for some burgers. While they advertise the “Best Burgers”, and they have many awards on the wall to prove it, none appeared more recent than 1999. So maybe they aren’t the best. But they were good. And the garlic fries were very tasty as well.
Once we had chowed down a quick dinner, we went over to the Bell Harbor Conference Center for the Gnomedex reception to start off the weekend. Met a few folks there, including Dave Winer, Chris Pirillo, Matthew Bookspan and David Kilsheimer, among others. Oh, and we had a fire drill. Fun, fun, fun. More to come shortly!