Vacation Day 5; San Jaun

Ashley and I woke up early on Sunday morning to leave Todd and Tina's place in Bellingham.  We had a short drive to a ferry but needed to arrive early so that we were able to board.  Rumor had it that first come first serve was brutal on a Sunday.  We made the 9am ferry to Friday Harbor and set out for Lime Kiln State Park.  Ashley spend the entire ferry ride at the edge of the boat looking for wildlife.

Lime Kiln State Park is know for its wildlife sightings as well as a tourist hotspot for their lighthouse.  I do not understand the fascination with lighthouses, or any human made structure really.  We basically ignored the lighthouse and set out for a short hike along the rocky beach.

Immediately, we were spotting seals just off the coast.  We must have seen about 6 or 8 by the time we hit the actual beach area.  Once at the beach, we were confronted with massive jellyfish nearly washing up on the shoreline.  No one even dared step into the water there were so many!

While taking some pictures of the jellies, we heard a rustling behind us about 30 feet away where the beach gave way to forest.  There was a deer eating the berries and leaves of a nearby bush.  I photographed the deer for awhile until some less than polite humans tried to get close to it and the deer bolted.  Walking back up to the trail-head we spotted a pod of porpoises swimming just off the shoreline.

We left Lime Kiln State Park early due to a fear that we would not make the ferry back to the mainland.  We had a reservation for a later ferry down the road so it was important that we were able to get on the 3pm ferry off of Friday Harbor.

Fortunately, we were one of the last people to get a in the que for the 3pm ferry but it left us about 2 hours in Friday Harbor to wander around.  It was mostly a tourist trap with petty trinkets and overpriced goods.  After awhile we stumbled on a treasure.  Sea Shepherd is based out of Friday Harbor and they had a storefront!  It was a pretty awesome volunteer run shop that all proceeds go to funding the anti-whaling efforts of the Sea Shepherd crew.

After a series of ferries and a couple hours of driving, we ended up in Heart O'the Old Hills campground in Olympic National Park.  This would be the next leg of our journey but not until Monday, it was late and we were beat.