Let the Wandering Resume

This is the first Wanderlusting Blog after my experiment with FB. This blog contains pictures and words I have already published on FB, but I have several friends who do not follow FB. Also, I like to do more with the blog than offer a travelogue of our journey. So, I will do a weekly version (as I have over the last three months.) I will rewrite some of the entries and add a bit of a preface and a postscript. Feel free to skip this and just read the FB posts. Or you can read this one exclusively. Or go ahead and read all of it. It is your call. I enjoy sharing our journey and look forward to having you along.

We began the week in Gig Harbor, WA, at the Sun Outdoor Gig Harbor RV Resort. Our week there was mostly about resting after 10 weeks of heavy-duty wandering. Toward the end of the week, we did get out and about as the weather cleared up and went to the local museum and maritime center.

The original people of Gig Harbor were the Puyallup Tribe. They settled in this area over 10,000 years ago and used it as their Fall and Winter fishing grounds. The salmon and other pelagic fish fill the river each Fall, and the catch would sustain the people through the winter until they returned to the inland to hunt and gather fruits, grains, and berries. This food gathering and storing required a high level of skill and generations of acquired knowledge. The women of the tribes were the carriers of this knowledge and skill. The first picture shows the modern generation's use of this technology. Imagine they are practicing a life skill that has passed through 500 generations! Each pattern is slightly different, and thousands of women have left their unique contributions to these vital pieces of daily life. 

The second picture is baskets from earlier generations. Unfortunately, these artifacts did not survive the 1000s of years. In them, we see these women's hard work and creative talents and the culture that grew out of their genius.

Gig Harbor, Washington, is a small town across the Narrows from Tacoma. When we got here, I knew nothing about it other than it was the location of our RV Park. There is a lot more to this place than a small harbor. In 1840 Captain Wilkes took shelter in this small bay off Puget Sound in his Gig, the captain's boat used to ferry passengers and supplies to and from the ship. This is a replica of that Gig, named the Porpoise. The mouth of the bay was too shallow for the ship, but it would allow the Gig to enter. The bay was called Gig Harbor, with tongue tucked firmly in his cheek.

 

Gig Harbor was settled by Europeans with a large community from Croatia who found a climate and coastline like their own. They were fishermen and boatbuilders who left their imprint on the harbor and community that grew around it. They built many boats in the "Mosquito Fleet" that provided ferry service and moving of goods around Puget Sound. They also made fishing vessels that fished the North Atlantic. It still has some fishing and builds a few well-known canoes and kayaks. But it is primarily a bedroom community for both Tacoma and Seattle and a weekend tourist destination. The Maritime and Community Museum was an excellent introduction to this small and historic village.

 

After our week in Gig Harbor, we headed north for the Olympic Peninsula. We traveled along Puget Sound and finally ended up on our old friend, US 101. We arrived in Port Angeles, WA, and set up for a week at Olympic Peninsula / Port Angeles KOA.

 

Port Angeles is located about two-thirds of the way from the Pacific Ocean at Cape Flattery and the mouth of Puget Sound on the south shore of the Salish Sea in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It was named Port of Our Lady of the Angels by Spanish Explorer Francisco de Eliza in 1791. English settlers shortened the name to Port Angeles in the 19^th century.

 

The city was twice anointed for greatness. The Federal Government, with the encouragement of Salmon Chase and Abraham Lincoln, laid out a federal city (second only to Washington DC) and sought to establish it as a Federal Hub in governing the Pacific Northwest. Unfortunately, their agent died in the Shipwreck of Brother Jonathan, and all government operations were transferred to Port Townsend. In 2003 a significant expansion of the port was planned with the cooperation of private and federal money. But when digging began, the workers uncovered the Clallam village of Tse-whit-zen, complete with the largest native burial site on record. The project was closed. 

 

The town, however, has thrived. Tourism became the primary industry, with the city serving as the major gateway to the Olympic Peninsula and Olympic National Park. In 2016, the town added Clallam Names for streets to the signs to recognize the long history and influence the Native People have had on the city and surrounding area. 

On our first day in town, we collected information for our week on the Olympic Peninsula. We went to the visitor Center at the National Park and the local visitor center at the harbor. 

 

One of the displays at the National Park was this whaling boat from the Indigenous People of the peninsula. It is roughly 25-30 feet long and 3-4 feet wide. Eight crewmen would set out on the Straits of Juan de Fuca in search of whales and seals. They carried harpoons, handmade rope, and a lance. They also brought centuries of remembered and shared skills, well-practiced teamwork, extraordinary seamanship, and a boatload of raw courage. Once a spout was sighted, they would draw near the whale using only the paddles you see in the boat. They would begin throwing harpoons, some with multiple sealskin floats attached to the line, into the flesh of the thrashing whale. The whale would drag them around the Straits for many hours, and when the creature was sufficiently worn down, they would draw up alongside and throw the lance deep into the whale's body. If all had gone as planned, they would have 50 feet and 35 tons of deadweight to tow back to the shore. These were sophisticated people who understood themselves and their environment. They took no more than they needed to feed the village and offered respect and honor to all land and sea and all that inhabited them. We will be visiting their reservation in the next few days.

 

I look forward to listening and learning from their thousands of years of accumulated wisdom about life on Earth. I hope you come along with me with the same deep respect and awe for these ancient people.

This is one of several picturesque spots on Cape Flattery, WA. This is the NW most point of the Lower 48 and represents the second most western point for the USA. James Cook first described it on March 2, 1778, when he wrote, "…there appeared to be a small opening which flattered us with the hopes of finding a harbor… On this account, I called the point of land to the north of it Cape Flattery." It sits at the mouth of the Salish Sea that does lead inland to the Straits of Juan de Fuca and Puget Sound and represents a significant portal to the US and Canada. The windswept rocks surround a heavily wooded headland. As we walked out to the point, we both had visions of the Dark Forest in The Wizard of Oz. The old-growth forest was littered with trees and brush sculpted into magical shapes by the wind, rain, and years. When we reached the viewpoints on the point, the Pacific Ocean opened before us. The coastline was rugged volcanic rock that had been weathered by the forces of nature and harbored an astounding amount of life. As we walked back up the trail toward the parking area, my soul was filled with wonder, awe, a keen sense of mystery, and a deeper appreciation for the hidden realm beneath the surface of life. 

 

This is a Harbor Seal, the smallest of the pinnipeds (marine mammals) that live along the Pacific Northwest. This seal and a hundred or more of their tribe were resting on the Race Rocks just off the coast of British Columbia. We were told that, unlike whales, pinnipeds could not live 100% of the time in the cold Pacific water. They must get out and warm up on rocks soaking up the sunshine. Therefore, they spend much of their lives lying around and soaking up the warmth. They live in groups and have learned that the best way to survive in Orca infested waters is to travel and hunt in groups, not unlike birds that travel in huge flocks to ensure that enough survive to carry the species into the next generation. The same applies to the harvest of seals by the Native People of the area, who relied on them for food and many other necessities for life in these harsh lands. A generation may lose a few to predation. Still, there will be enough survivors to create the next generation if the predators (humans included) kill only what they need and leave the rest to lay in the sun and produce babies. To paraphrase my favorite Vulcan, "May they live long and prosper!"

While we were on a Whale Watching Cruise out of Port Angeles, see Puget Sound Express Cruises) we met Blizzard, the Humpback Whale. Every Humpback has distinctive markings on its flukes (tail flipper.) Shots such as these are sent into a central registry that records and tracks them as they are sighted. This fluke belongs to a 20-year-old whale (unsure of the sex) who was first sighted in Hawaii in 2012. It was spotted in the breeding grounds off Maui, so researchers believe it was likely 10 years old. Blizzard was feeding in the Straits of Juan de Fuca, and it has done over the years. These whales do not seem to eat when they travel to Hawaii for breeding. They lose as much as 30% of their weight on the journey there and back, so they must return to their feeding grounds, where they calve and regain up to 15 to 20 tons of weight. They have an esophagus the size of a grapefruit and eat tiny shrimp and small fish. I struggle to imagine how much they must eat to regain that much weight. I also struggle to imagine that much food in the Straits to feed all these huge, hungry creatures. Blizzard and its kin are incredible creatures and stir my soul whenever we encounter them. By the way, that pink stuff in the water is Whale poop. Answers that age-old question, does a whale poop in the ocean?

 

At the end of the week, we will head out and journey around the Sound through Tacoma and head to the Seattle Metro area and stay in Lake Pleasant RV Park in Bothell, WA. We look forward to seeing our Son, his spouse, and the Grands. We hope to spend time with a good friend as well. It will be a very busy week, and I hope you come along with us.

Before closing this week’s blog, I want to say a word about my travel companion for the last 50 years. This picture was taken from the Glacier Spirit while we were out on the Straits of Juan de Fuca looking for whales. Marlene has been at my side for five decades. We started dating in 1973 while students at SWT in my hometown of San Marcos. Since that time, she was walked with me through forty-plus states, three provinces, a Caribbean island, and half a dozen or so houses and apartments. She has endured my companionship with the same smile that first led me to notice her across the Music Building in the Fall of 1972. We became friends and then best friends. And now, 50 years later, I still cherish each day she allows me to hang around with her. I am deeply thankful for the years that have passed under our bridge. But that gratitude is nothing compared to the anticipation that fills my soul for the rest of the journey, still coming down the stream. I love you and cannot imagine making this or any other journey without you!

 

Bob