Washington - Day 15 - through Concrete to Winthrop

Pearrygin Lake State Park, Winthrop

Wednesday, 15 June 2022

today's route

I started the day in the part of western Washington called the Skagit Valley (named for the river), which is noted for its annual Tulip Festival.  More tulip and daffodil bulbs are produced in Skagit County than in any other in the country.  I drove through here one year when they were blooming and can attest that it's indeed a sight to see.  June's not the right month, though, and I didn't try to find the farms that produce them.

I saw lots of signs advertising rhubarb and asparagus and u-pick blueberries.

In Burlington, I passed a thrift shop with the sign, "Saving The Planet One Piece Of Used Furniture At A Time."  Another shop had this sign: "Summer is Coming - I Can Feel the Rain Getting Warmer."

I passed a couple of places called Lady Bug Bikini Espresso and was curious enough to look them up.  It's a drive-through place and all the baristas wear bikinis and the prices for drinks are much higher than average, apparently to pay for the show.  The Yelp comments were very poor, based on lousy customer service at several locations.  Oh well.

Getting on the road, I saw a sign saying, "Welcome to the Cascade Loop Scenic Highway."  It turned out to be very scenic as we looped around the Cascades.

Sedro-Woolley, the next town along, claimed to be the "Gateway to the North Cascades."

I heard a mention on the radio that somewhere on the Olympic Peninsula, there is or had been a QAnon mayor.  I know there's a lot of conservatism in that part of the state but hadn't realized it was that conservative, so I looked it up.  I found this really interesting article called The Town That QAnon Nearly Swallowed.   https://www.thenation.com/sequim-qanon

I passed the Upper Skagit Indian Reservation.

I saw quite a few "elk crossing" signs along this road, several with flashing lights.

"Litter and It Will Hurt" isn't a sign I've seen in any other state, but I saw it on this road.

This area was entirely farm country, except for the areas of high hills, thickly covered with trees.

My first destination was the town of Concrete, where David said he'd be sending me some mail to General Delivery.  And sure enough, it was there.  I really am a fan of the US Postal Service.

The story of how Concrete got its name is a little unusual (as is the name).  In 1871, early settlers called their new community Minnehaha.  In 1890, it was platted as Baker, named for the river it sat on.  In 1905, the Washington Portland Cement Co., built on the opposite bank, acquired a community of houses around it which took the name Cement City.  Three years later, the Superior Portland Cement Co. built a plant in Baker.  (Can't you just see all this happening?)  In 1909, the 2 towns decided to merge and, after much discussion, took the name Concrete.  (How can anybody get bored with history?)

For much of the drive, the road followed the Skagit River, known as a Bald Eagle hang-out area.  And sure enough, I passed the turn for the Skagit Valley Bald Eagle Interpretative Center.

A little farther on, I came to a rest area that had some information about the critters.

This is the sign - details enlarged below.

I saw a private road with the name Ponder Roses.  Somebody's got a sense of humor.

The town of Marblemount says it's the "Entrance to the American Alps."

A rented RV came down the road toward me.  I've seen them all over the country and I especially like seeing them in odd places.  It means to me that these are adventurous people.

At Newhalem, I came to the Skagit River Hydroelectric Project, which some research told me is owned by Seattle City Light and is a series of 3 dams on the Skagit River.  The one I passed here was the powerhouse for the Gorge Dam.  Farther along I passed the 2nd dam, Diablo Dam, which I visited many years ago with some law school friends on another camping trip.  I remember being told that Diablo was pronounced with a long i, as in eye, instead of as a long e, which is the Spanish pronunciation (it is a Spanish word, after all).  Wikipedia doesn't say one way or another.

I came unexpectedly to a tunnel that wasn't lighted inside.  The result was a blackness that was so total my headlights seemed to make no difference and it was disorienting.

I crossed the Gorge Creek Bridge and saw a very large, pretty waterfall.  Some folks had stopped at a small parking area, including an angry young man, who was scowling as he walked to his vehicle and utterly ignored the fact that he was blocking me from pulling in to park.  He started up his pickup, which pulled a long empty flatbed trailer, and created a terrible exhaust smell.  I got a cab-full and decided to let him lose himself on the road up ahead of me.

The road climbed steeply above Diablo Lake and I could see the dam in the distance below.  I passed the John Pierce Falls, which the internet told me is one of 3 major waterfalls visible from this North Cascades Highway.  Actually, I saw lots of waterfalls, but I guess there's a difference between the run-of-the-mill kind and the "major" kind.

I also saw parking for lots of hiking trails, and the highway crossed the Pacific Crest Trail at one point.  That's the crest that (unlike the Appalachian Trail) runs along the upper elevations of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges.  One end is near the US/Mexico border and the other is near the US/Canada border.

There were several spots of road construction along the road, including a few that were complex enough to require a pilot car.  At one of those, I saw the angry young man several cars ahead of me and, as he passed the flagger, I saw her waving her hand by her face having been gassed by his still-terrible exhaust smell.  I'd hoped I'd lost him but there he still was, and I had to do some maneuvering to keep away from him.

The road was still climbing and I started to see snow beside the road.

A sign warned me "No homegrown fruit beyond this point.  Apple maggot quarantine area."  Online I learned that WA produces 60% of the country's apples, and when apple maggots appeared some years ago, everybody took it very seriously.  I never saw any checkpoints like California has, but I also never heard of anyone poo-pooing the warning, either.

I came to Washington Pass, elev. 5,477'.  Since Burlington, where I started this morning, sits at an elevation of 36', you can see I really have been climbing today.  Another sign said I could expect a 7% grade for the next 7 miles.  Always something to look forward to.

I passed people carrying skis.  It's mid-June, but there's clearly snow around here.

I stopped twice for photos.

It really is pretty up here.  That's the Okanagan National Forest you see.

After I left the North Cascades Scenic Byway, I passed 2 signs (at intervals) - big yellow signs with black letters saying, "CAUTION Methow Valley Deer Kill Rate" and then underneath one figure for "YTD" and the other "Annual".  Those signs, and a few others like them, are the work of a volunteer who gathers as best he can information about the number of deer/vehicle collisions along this road.  He said the Methow Valley (the Methow River runs through it) is prone to more of such lethal encounters than most other areas of the state.  The sign I saw said the "annual" figure was 142, and I guess that's an average, which is pretty high when you stop to think about it.  I couldn't read the YTD figure because there was so much else on that sign I was trying to remember.

In fact, a little farther on, I saw a deer run across the road almost under the wheels of an oncoming car.  It must have shaken up that driver.

And even farther on, the speed limit was lowered to 45 mph during the nighttime to protect deer.

Near the town of Mazama, I came to a free range area and to watch for livestock, which seems odd in a mountainous area like this, but that's what the sign said.

Although this wasn't technically a "scenic" area, it was still pretty.  On the left of the road was the river and on the right were wide cropfields that ran back into the mountains.  Lots of red oriental poppies.

A sign at a private home said, "Firefighters, You Rock."

Another, more public sign said, "Weeds are a pain the grass - Do your part - Stop the spread of noxious weeds."  As I understand it, the state has an official list of noxious weeds, and by law landowners are required to control these weeds.  A whole different kind of weed control law.

I could tell I had reached the other side of the Cascades, because the hills had become much lower and I started seeing lots of crops.

I came to Winthrop, which seems to be really big on holding festivals.  In March, when there's still snow on the ground, they hold a hot-air balloon festival.  In May they hold their '49er Days historical festival.  In July they have a rhythm & blues festival.  And this year I just missed their first annual Cidergrass Festival, which celebrates apple cider and bluegrass music.  Clearly a place to have fun.

I headed through town, which actually looked very Old West-y, and up a few roads through the country towards tonight's state park.  In town, the speed limit was posted at 25 mph, and along the following roads I saw signs saying, "It's Still 25 MPH."  A little humor will go a long way with me.

There were a lot of marmots in the campground.  Dext found the first one for me, a very large one that was sitting at its hole keeping an eye on us.  It was putting out a loud sound something like one of Dext's squeaky toys, and farther along I saw 4 other smaller ones diving for their holes.  That first one must have been the lookout.