We are fortunate to live close to the internationally known Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. We go most years. Tulips remind me of my grandmother, Bernice "Bunny" Clewley Dorr.
When I was a child my grandparents built a cabin on Green Lake in Maine. Our family spent many happy days there. She had a little garden there that my grandfather fenced in for her. Every year my grandmother planted tulips. Every year the deer jumped the fence and ate them. She loved tulips!
We still visit with family on the lake, but a few doors down from the old property every year. The garden is no longer there, but every time I walk past where it was I imagine her gardening there.
So Nan, this one is for you!
Skagit Valley Tulip Festival
This is the 32nd year of the festival. It is held on a previously set date and accompanied by many community activities. Unfortunately the tulips bloomed very early this year which put the blooming fields and the festival a bit out of sync, but everyone still calls the time that all the flowers are blooming the Festival.
The valley was first settled in the 1860s. The settlers built dikes to reclaim the flatlands from frequently flooding and an agricultural economy grew. In the nearby mountains, logging was a big industry and the ocean provided fishing.
The scenery in the Skagit County is spectacular. The Skagit River comes out of the Cascade Range above the valley. It has salmon runs every year and in December - January every year you can see the Bald Eagles who arrive in the area for food. It is not unusual to see 100 or more Bald Eagles on the same day. We have floated the river with a guide to see them from the river and it is a chilly but very rewarding experience.
The town of La Connor, an old fishing village, is the closest one to the tulip festival. It is a great place to eat lunch and wander around looking at the numerous artists shops. It is on the Swinomish Channel. Facing the town is the Swinomish Reservation, a casino is not far away. The views of the San Juan Islands and the Puget Sound are incredible. In good weather, the blue, blue sky, the dark blue water and the green hills and islands are very picturesque.
Picture of San Juan Islands from nearby Deception Pass
The picture above is of the islands that are off the coast of the Skagit Valley. The beach is at Deception Pass to the south of the Skagit Valley.
The valley is filled with historical sites, including many old barns. The library has a driving tour of the old barns left in the county.
In the 20th century the valley became famous for growing seed stock and selling the seeds, and for its bulbs. The number of bulb growers has declined but the fields are still vast and beautiful. There are two main sites to visit to see displays, Roozengaarde and Tulip Town. We prefer Roozengaarde for the 4 acres of carefully designed and planted displays. One can also drive around the valley and see all the fields in bloom and take pictures from the edges of the fields.
The following history of the company is from their website.
William Roozen emigrated from Holland in 1947 with years of experience in the bulb industry. He had a good back, strong hands, and a heart pulsing with dreams. Roozen started a bulb farm on five acres of land, holding meetings in a garage and toiling long hours beside a few hired hands. He saved money by buying used tractors and farm equipment.
Today, Roozen's small company has grown to be the largest tulip-bulb grower in the country and one of the largest employers in the Skagit Valley. The flower industry in the Skagit Valley has become an important element of the county's economy.
The Roozen family's hard work ethic spans at least six generations. The family first began raising tulips in Holland in the mid-1700's.
In the Skagit Valley, Roozen (which means "roses" in Dutch) worked for other farmers before setting off on his own in 1950. Five years later, he purchased the Washington Bulb Co., founded by two of the area's first bulb farmers, Joe Berger and Cornelius Roozekrans. The Washington Bulb Co. now farms about 2,000 acres of land.
The family children and grandchildren now run the business.
Take the time to explore the sights of the surrounding area and have lunch in La Connor - we always do. This is our favorite place there for lunch.
About once a year we go camping at Deception Pass State Park which is the most beautiful park in the state of Washington. It is just past the Skagit Valley on Whidbey Island. You can get to the Island from I-5 on the north end or by taking the ferry on the south end. There are many things to see and do on beautiful Whidbey Island. You can also take a boat tour of Deception Pass.
All these pictures are from Roozengaarde. There is a shop for cut flowers, a food tent and a very nice (and crowded gift shop).
I separated the pictures into 3 slide shows. The first one is of the area around the garden including the snow on the mountains above.
The second singles out individual flowers and the third is shots of the masses of color. Instead of looking up each flower myself to get the name that Roozengaarde uses for it here is the catalog of tulips that you can explore for yourself. The varieties and colors are amazing!
Views of the Garden Setting
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Individual Tulips
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Masses of Color
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An outing to the Skagit Valley is always worth it, whether or not the tulips are blooming.
Next blog will be from Vancouver, British Columbia.
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The Florida Panther is an endangered species. There are a few in the Everglades.
Earlier this year, we passed through the Miami area on our way to and from Peru. Neither Carl nor I had ever been to the Everglades nor the Florida Keys and as we are both interested in both history and nature, we agreed that these would be good places to visit as breaks from the very long airplane trips between Seattle and Peru.
I was particularly thrilled by the Everglades.Carl had found an interpretive boat trip that started in the Flamingo area of the Everglades and went through the canals and lakes of the that area of the National Park. We did not go on the air boats as the trips were shorter on them. It was a great decision as the slow trolling through the waters gave us a good chance to see and take pictures.
We stayed in Panama City, the original hotel we were going to stay in had a power outage but we were able to find a vacancy in a near by hotel.The hotel clerk had told Carl about a place that had wonderful milkshakes and smoothees made with a variety of tropical fruits. It was called Robert is Here! It turned out to sell all those tropical fruits you may have heard of and a lot you haven't heard about as well as the drinks. The fruits are listed on the link above. It also had a nice outside seating area with barnyard animals and exotic birds. It is definitely not a fancy place but really fun to explore.
Coconut Palms
We then took the short drive into the Everglades. We passed Coconut palms that I had to get pictures of, areas growing market crops and then into the Everglades through the Sea of Grass.
I was surprised to see very tall pine trees after we first entered the park. These were pines that grow in certain conditions in the area. Following that, amid all the sawgrass were trees that looked dead. It turned out that they were a variety of cypress that goes dormant when precipitation is lower than normal.
The grass grows to the edges of the road and you can see the water below the grass tops. There are turnoffs and walking areas so that you can explore various features. We expected many mosquitoes which was true in some areas but we did not have any on the boat ride.
Hwy 9356 (light line) on the map shows the Route from Florida City to Flamingo
The birds were wonderful. I really wanted to see a rosy spoonbill but only saw one at a distance in the Key West area. It is a beautiful birds. All over Southern Florida we enjoyed the beautiful sight of vultures soaring on the currents. It is such a surprise that birds that are that ugly up close are so beautiful in the air. We wondered why we would see so many of them swoop down near shopping centers and when we were in the Everglades we found out why. At the Royal Palms area of the park, they had a stack of blue tarps for people to tie down over cars as the vultures enjoy eating the rubber around windows and doors!
Putting blue tarp over car to protect from Vultures
The wading birds were huge. Herons, egrets, storks and related birds were an exciting sight for us. We do have the Great Blue Heron in the Pacific Northwest and we always like to see them flying overhead or fishing. We have particularly noted them as we drive around North America. In Southern Florida, they have a white variation of this bird. It can be differentiated from the Great Egret with grey rather than black legs as well as herons keep their necks pulled back as they fly and egrets do not.
We did not see any of the invasive pythons that have been living in the Everglades, but we can sure see why they are so hard to find and capture in all the undergrowth, twisted roots and combination of water and vegetation.
We went straight through the lower Everglades to catch our scheduled boat trip.
The two and a half hour boat trip was wonderful. There was a naturalist on board to answer questions. It was obvious that people had come from all over the world for this opportunity. The first thing we saw was an osprey nest with the nesting bird at the edge of the boarding dock. After the boat started, we immediately saw two manatees underwater. They did not emerge while we were there but they are huge. Then we saw a baby crocodile.
I have pictures of most of these things in my slideshow.
I was fascinated by the reflection of the trees and mangrove roots in the dark reddish brown water. It is turned that color is from the decaying vegetation that it flows through.
The canal we were following was an old artificial canal. Many of the old canals have been closed off in an attempt to restore the natural balance of the Everglades.
Early settlers to the area drained the wetlands to create farmland and areas for housing. The Everglades National Park was established in 1947 and protects an area 20% the size of the original swamp area.
After we finished the boat tour, We stopped at a couple of places in the park on the way back to the hotel. We decided to return the next day to the Royal Palms area. It was almost dark when we had gotten there and we wanted to explore the board walks over the swamp area. That is where we saw the majority of birds and animals I have pictured. The board walks were a terrific idea. They put you right in the middle of the swamp. (Along with quite a few very excited school kids.)
We had lunch by drinking smoothees at the "Here's Robert Fruit Stand" and then returned to the Park to take wonderful bird pictures. Mostly beside the road. We left late that evening for Peru. (See previous blog for this account.)
A while after we got home I was watching a video on the Andrew Hurricane in South Florida 23 years ago and I was shocked that the whole area we had been in was devastated by the hurricane. In the Everglades in some areas all the taller mangrove trees had been felled and of course, we know that Homestead and Florida City were leveled by the hurricane, partly due to shoddy construction.
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The Florida Keys
On our return from Peru, we rented a car and traveled to the Florida Keys - destination Key West. My brother had lived for a while on Marathon Key and my father had raced yachts around the Keys as a young man so I was anxious to experience the area. I also wanted to go on the long highway through the Keys.
The overseas highway to Key West that connects a number of Keys was built mostly on an old railway line that had been completed in 1912 and heavily damaged by the Labor Day Hurricane in 1935. Since the Florida Coast Railway could not afford to rebuilt the railroad, the State of Florida bought the right of ways and remaining bridges for $640,000. The highway is about 111 miles long. Plans are underway to fit it with a trail for bikes. Full description here.
Now I know why people live there. It is a wonderful relaxing place with a lot of interesting stops, beautiful views, great birds and a laid back atmosphere.
It took about 3 hours to drive the highway to Key West. We stopped at a place called Sombrero Beach so that I could walk through the sands and wade in the surf. The water was not as warm as I expected. It was the Atlantic Ocean at that point, I wonder if the other side of the key would be warmer?
Sombrero Beach
The houses in this area were mostly on stilt like columns to raise their height off the ground and keep them above the water.
Home near Sombrero Beach
The plantings around the houses were beautiful. I neglected to take pictures of the plants that resembled Pampas Grass but had light pink plumes. They were very attractive.
When we got to our hotel, Ibis Bay Beach Resort. It was built in the 1956 out of blocks of coral! That part made me cringe, but it was a nice place to stay. The rooms were very Retro 1950s with Cuban posters on the wall. The resort area was surrounded by water.
Poster in our room
Our hotel made out of coral blocks
We had a really great dinner the first night at the Conch Republic which was a fun place and our food was terrific.
Lobster ravioli. Worth a trip back!
The hotel had a shuttle into the town. The houses were so interesting but very, very expensive. The atmosphere was very festive and relaxed. Even though it was the middle of winter, it was not terribly crowded. The next day I wanted to go to the Butterfly Conservatory. It was a good decision. Lots of butterflies,tropical flowers and plants, and birds that do not eat butterflies!
One of the beautiful butterflies at the conservatory
We spent several hours at the conservatory, and bought some nice little gifts and things for ourselves. My favorite was a butterfly T-shirt for me.
My butterfly T-shirt
I was tired from our trip, so I hung around the hotel and watched the birds landing on the Bird Island across the water and took pictures.
Bird Island with long distance lens. Like "Where's Waldo"?
Carl continued exploring the area on his own. As we were leaving the hotel an iguana was perched in the foliage. Very cool.
We traveled back up the highway stopping a few times to take pictures and then on to the airport to catch our flight back to Seattle.
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Handicap Hint
I want to add here that if you have trouble walking and depend on wheelchairs for long walks at the airport, be sure that if you take red-eye flights that you will be able to get some kind of assistance if you need to go in between terminals. When we got into Phoenix in the middle of the night, there was no handicap assistance in between terminals. The transportation that they had in the form of an elevated rail, did not go to all the terminals and I wound up with a very long walk and being exhausted. The car rental at Miami was an extremely long way from where our plane landed and took off as well so be aware.
Other than that, this was a wonderful trip that I would recommend to anyone.
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Next blog on the Washington Skagit Valley Tulip Festival.
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