Lopez Island part 2....

Some more scenes from Lopez Island. Heron on post
Blackberries everywhere.....this is true in Seattle, too. You can stop and pick blackberries all over.

They were shingling this little tower. We asked what it was.....a water tower. There was another one in the town also.

A better shot of that church tower.

Old barn

Wind vane on the local museum

The museum was closed but we walked around the outside where there were a few things on display and some photos.

Difficult to shoot through fence, but the old stove looked interesting.

Old farm equipment

In town....an couple of fish sculptures

House for sale....got lots of money???? We didn't ask, but I'd guess half a million at least.

Left Lopez and headed towards Friday Harbor on San Juan Island the next day. Nice sailboat.

In Friday Harbor planes were landing among the boats going in and out. Sort of scary in my opinion!

Everyone made it safely.

Pigeons

A gull. We ate lunch at a nice place in this harbor and explored the shops a little before moving on towards home.

This may be my last post unless I get back to this library where I am using the Wifi.

San Juan Islands....Lopez visit part 1

Thursday morning we drove to La Conner and boated out into the San Juan Islands. Beautiful little group of islands located between Washington State and Vancouver Island, Canada. One of the small islands on the way to Lopez Island where we were going to spend the night.

The weather was overcast the entire time we were in the islands, but everything was still beautiful.

A variety of pleasure boats of all sorts run the waters in between the islands.

Ferries run to some of the larger islands. The advantage to the ferry is having a car once you get to your destination. There are bikes and kayaks to be rented on the island we were headed towards, but we weren't going to be there long enough to bother renting.

A first view towards Lopez Village where we would stay. It is a half mile walk from the marina to the village. I liked this church that can be seen through the old barn here. It had an unusual tower....square with 4 small corner towers on top.

We stayed at Lopez Lodge, which I would recommend. This was the view from our window. We are behind a bakery...good place to have breakfast! This part of the village is on a spit of land sticking out between the bay where the marina is and more water that you see here beyond the houses.

Some crows? I saw on a fence while walking around. Mike and I decided to walk out the spit towards the water to see what birds we could see.

We hadn't gone far when we saw a sign for a wetlands trail between the hedgerows. There are suppose to be lots of sparrows there and swallows. We saw both but I'm not sure which ones.

A sign giving more information about the transition area between the fields and the saltmarsh. It mentions Savannah Sparrows, Song Sparrows, Violet-Green Swallows and Barn Swallows. I may have seen them all.

I liked this misty view out over the fields.

Over the meadow towards the water with the marina in the distance.

A swallow on a branch

A sparrow

There was a huge area of logs between the meadow and the water. Left over from logging days maybe? The birds love it.

The logs with the vegetation growing between.

A sparrow peeking out of the bushes.

Sparrow on one of the logs.

Another sparrow. There were plenty of House Sparrows around, too. I saw one feeding a baby...just like at home :-)

Ducks settling in for the night. You can see a light drizzle was falling.

Gulls settled in. Not sure about those spotty birds.

Great Blue Heron fishing for supper.

A view of the beach area from a little public access spot. Much is private property. There is much more to Lopez Island that with a car or bike would be wonderful to explore. I'd like to go back and spend a week there rather than one night!

Part of today and lots of irritation with trying to post...

I may post at odd hours...too much aggrevation to try to set these up normal. (This photo of the flicker is suppose to be down with the other flicker photos. However I can not make it go where I want it. The internet access here is horrible and slow.)

We had lunch today at the house of some people who live in a beautiful log house on this river.This is the Cedar River and there is a bike/hiking trail along stretches of it that I intend to go back to before we leave to try to see birds. This was the view from the backyard of this home....beautiful place! I was more interested in the river than the cookout.

I liked this rock in the water.

Spotted a couple of deer heading back into the woods downstream.

This Flicker is at my sister's and was busy drilling holes in the yard looking for bugs. I think it is the Red-Shafted version of the Northern Flicker. Either a female or young.

It was so intent on the yard, that it didn't care in the least about me watching it.

A young Robin joined it. I didn't realize this was a robin at first...looked odd to me (the cheek patch). All the familiar birds out here seem a little bit different than their Eastern cousins back where I live. Basically the birds I have seen so far are ones I see at home.

Probably heading to LaConnor tomorrow and boating out to an island.

Market Day in Renton....

Yesterday was a long day. We got up in Indy at 3AM Central time and ended the day in Seattle many hours later on Pacific time. It was mostly a flying day and a family day. However, we did go to the Farmer's Market Day in Renton. Not as large as the more famous Pike Street Market in downtown Seattle, but we have been to Pike Street many times before. Renton is a suburb of Seattle where my sister lives and their outdoor market day is every Tuesday.I always love the buckets of flowers and watching them make the beautiful bouquets.
Simply gorgeous in all colors and types.

The finished bouquets sell for $5.

There were so many wonderful things to see and buy. Mike and I tried these Peach and Blueberry Squares.....yummmmm!

Look at all the breads!

I always eat raspberries while out here.

The veggies were varied and colorful. I'll just show a few of them.

I liked the way these cabbages looked, all purple and blue at the same time.

Assorted root veggies.

Squash blossomes....I've never eaten them, but had just read a recipe for them in our newspaper last week. Of course I don't have it with me.

Lovely round white onions.

And how about a nice Dungeness Crab? Not while it is looking at me!

This huge chunk of meat was cooking and people were lined up waiting to buy.

I had taken other photos around my sister's house of plants and things I don't see at home, but it takes 5 minutes to load photos on this Wifi hookup, so I may have to rethink my posting schedule while here.

I'm really sleepy....goodnight!