With another sunny early spring day promised, the boys quickly worked on their school work so we could get done and onto the day. Homeschooling can be interesting – you are done 30 minutes after public school starts their day. Then you have your day free to do what catches your eyes.
We decided to take the ferry across the Salish Sea to Port Townsend. We had no set idea or plan. The ferry ride was calm, the Salish Sea Lake comes with spring instead of the ferry heaving back and forth in the choppy waves. As usual we parked on the Whidbey Island side at the state park parking lot by the ferry dock, and walked on. Minors are now free on Washington State ferries, making this an affordable trip ($3.95 for my adult walk on ticket each way). The minors ride free on public transportation scheme our state passed this past year is a socialist scheme to get kids used to public transportation, but eh, I don’t mind it. I see it like public libraries – it has more positives than negatives. I’ve noticed we ride the ferries a lot more now, than we did in the past. For sure it encourages me to take them on field trips. At least I get something back I use for all the insane taxes we pay here.
Politics aside, it was really a nice day.
And then I noticed something as we walked from the ferry dock to the trailhead. The city of Port Townsend had cleared up the area. Last year when we last hiked the Kah Tai Lagoon park, it was a stream of broken down RV’s with leaking black tanks along the road, and encampments in the park itself, along with many people openly doing drugs, right off the sidewalks and trails.
It was nearly all gone. We only saw 2 men loitering in a small encampment, and they were actually trying to hide.
Maybe it’s the season (it’s not summer yet) but it just felt so much safer – and healthier. We even passed a large group of happy senior citizens out hiking.
We came in off of Landes Street. The park entrance is just past the transit center (which all sits behind Safeway on Hwy 20). Landes doesn’t have a sidewalk on this side, but has a wide shoulder and is not a busy road. It’s a short walk from Safeway. The trail connects Landes to Kearney Street. As I have talked about before, Port Townsend has a massive system of trails that cross the town, up and over the hills. They are not well graded necessarily, but they get you where you want to get. It allows you to bypass the busy roads or ones that have no sidewalks. This trail is wide and flat, one of the real nice ones of the system.
There was a new book being featured on the Story Walk on the main trail. When We Are Kind, written in English and Diné (Navajo). It’s an excellent book to learn lessons from.
Red Currant, not yet in flowering, but almost there.
Kah Tai Lagoon. There were many ducks out, of a couple types. All finding partners to make babies with it seemed.
Spring is just starting along the lagoon.
Soon the trees will open and the green will return.
The boys enjoyed the many stops along the way, reading the book. We stopped far too often to check out birds, and blooms just opening.
It wasn’t a wilderness hike. It’s an urban stroll for sure.
The boys would say it’s so much more fun to do this than sit in a dim building for 8 hours a day. And I get to be with them all day. And maybe that is what matters. You can find education as you walk. And learn so much more. We put in around 6 miles wandering all over and the boys were happy to get on the ferry.
The mountains were out in the blue skies. Mt. Baker rises above the North and Central Cascades, far across the water. The other direction is the Olympic Mountains, just a short drive out of Port Townsend.
~Sarah