Washington State

Places to visit in the state of Washington

Seattle’s Cheshiahud Loop: Pipes, Bridges, and Houseboats

Travel articles often suggest that one needs to look at their own region through the eyes of a tourist. Since I am not always traveling to distant places to write about, I often look around the Seattle community to find experiences and places to share. That recently led me to discover Cheshiahud Loop, a route that goes all the way around Lake Union. The online information stated it was a six and a half mile walk. We figured that would…

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Ballard Locks: Boats, Salmon, Gardens and History

Seattle is a city practically surrounded by water. To the west is Puget Sound while to the east is Lake Washington. Water activities are an important part of life here. Historically the early pioneers used the waterways for transportation. As a result one of the early decisions was to connect Lake Washington to Puget Sound by digging a canal. When they realized that Lake Washington was higher in elevation than Puget Sound, they knew they needed to built locks for…

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Tacoma, Washington’s Colorful Art Glass Scene

One thing that many people outside of the Seattle area may not know is that the Puget Sound region has a strong emphasis upon art through glass. Dale Chihuly was born in Tacoma, Washington. He became a forward thinking glass artist whose works can be found all over the world. They include huge chandeliers of glass that stretch five or six feet downwards as well as glass pieces in outdoor gardens. His contribution to glass making has had a big…

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Being a Personal Tour Guide in Washington State

Most of the time when I write a blog post, I write about myself and my experiences encountering other locations and cultures. In this post I want to reverse that. I thought I would share my experience as a sort of personal tour guide for someone from the African country of Malawi. In January of 2020 I went to Malawi for two weeks to teach pastors at a Bible school. That came about after meeting Bern the director of the…

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Surviving a Challenging Hike to Lake Ingalls

In June my brother contacted me and asked me if I wanted to go on a nine mile hike with him to Lake Ingalls. That seemed a very long hike for me, but I know I can easily walk five miles on the trails around here so I thought I would probably be able to manage a nine mile hike although I knew it would be a challenge. My brother David is almost exactly a year older than I am.…

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Through Anacortes and La Conner, the Long Way Home

After four days exploring Whidbey Island, it was time to go home. However, we didn’t want to just drive straight home. This was an opportunity to spend a little more time exploring some of the towns in this region. We would take the long way home. If you remember, we took the ferry coming over to Whidbey Island. For our return trip we would go around the north end to catch the freeway going south. People leave Whidbey Island when…

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Forts and Nature converge in North Whidbey Island

Friday turned out to be a beautiful day on Whidbey Island. It was a great day for hiking which is what we spent most of the day doing. After getting ready in the morning, we headed back down to Fort Ebey State Park. While yesterday we spent time there on the beach, today we would spend most of our time in the woods. Fort Ebey was built in 1942 to help protect the Puget Sound region. Its purpose was to…

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Exploring the Unique Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve

Last week I mentioned that the central part of Whidbey Island was part of Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve. This is truly a unique situation in terms of the National Park System. 85% of the land within this reserve is privately owned. Nevertheless the national, state, county, and city of Coupeville have worked together to make this a place where the historical, cultural and geographic uniqueness of the region is preserved. Visitors won’t necessarily know they are in a national…

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From a Park, a Garden, and a Farm to Coupeville

The weather forecast for Wednesday had predicted gloomy weather, but much to our surprise we woke up to mostly clear skies and a sunny outlook. After eating breakfast at our hotel, we were readyfor the day. We would travel back south, but be in more of the central part of the island ending up in Coupeville. Our first destination was South Whidbey State Park. While this park is on the water’s edge, the focus of the park is more hiking…

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