We got going early and headed onto Whidbey Island. The morning drive was beautiful through the rainforest, and fields, and windy roads. We were on our way to see Ebey’s Landing, a national historic site for the first Homestead that was set on the island. We ended up in Coupeville, a cute little seaside town that had the visitor center for the national Park. We toured the museum, which was very well set up and explained the homesteading and growth of the islands.
We had a fairy to catch in the evening to Friday Harbor in the San Juan Islands. We stopped at a park next to the ferry and walk the dogs, and toured the trail system that they have there that describes the seaside habitat. The ferry ride was uneventful and we arrived in Friday Harbor around 9 o’clock. That’s when the fun began. We didn’t have reservations for a campground and there aren’t a lot of open camping spaces here. We tried the county park, it was full with a grouchy troll lady there. We tried another campground that didn’t have anybody there except for a bunch of chairs for a wedding. it looked like, so we just left there. We finally ended up at the fairgrounds and found an empty spot. It turns out the fairgrounds or just about a 10 minute walk from downtown so that worked out perfectly. They have some issues with their booking system, and I reserved a site while here, get the Campos an hour later gave the site to somebody else. So we just told him we’d share the site and they refunded the money.
The San Juan national Park here in the island is actually two places. The northern part is the British camp and the southern part of the American camp. It turns out that there was almost a war between the US and Britain over a farmer killing a British pig. There was some disagreement in how the borderlines that extended past the 49th parallel were to be interpreted. Fortunately, the whole thing was solved peacefully and since they were actually three streets in the area, the international line was set between Vancouver Island and the San Juan Islands, in the US became the owner of the San Juan’s.
After visiting the parks, which incidentally are only about 15 to 20 miles apart, we parked the truck, took the dogs for a walk, and then proceeded into town to look at the interesting buildings and browse some shops. The town was having a 75th anniversary of the harbor and was giving away smoked salmon and salads, but we ended up not finding that place until later. We had some good food at an Asian restaurant. On the walk back it started to rain so we ducked into a bar and had a beverage or two. It’s a cute little town, however, coming here is very expensive. It’s about $100 to get the truck camper round-trip on the ferry, and the campgrounds are upwards of $50 a night. Fortunately you don’t spend much on gas here because it’s only a 20 mile island. It’s a good thing because diesel is almost 6 dollars a gallon here.
Here are the rest of the photos for the past few days.
https://www.overlandadventureexcursions.com/photos-albums/nggallery/album/20250905-06-whidbey-and-san-juan-island