Weekend Trip to the Islands

To celebrate me becoming a Lawful Permenant Resident of the US, Robert surprised me with a weekend trip to some of the islands around Seattle. How sweet and thoughtful! We took a ferry to Bainbridge Island, and then traveled to Langley to stay there overnight. We got back around 7:00pm on Sunday, tanned, tired but contented.

There are too many wonderful things about the weekend trip. We found us happy and smiling for the entire weekend. Here are a few highlights:
1. 15 mins - a ferry ride away from the city Seattle are a bunch of peaceful little islands. They are neat, quiet and a bit rustic. We felt our minds being peaced and souls being rinsed, the moment we got off the ferry at the Baybridge side. Every island has its own town center, which is composed of many individual and creative art shops and food stores. Every island is surrounded with beautiful beaches, which I find are especially exotic with all the drift wood sitting elegantly there.

2. Visiting the spendid Bloedel Reserve. Located on the north tip of Bainbridge Island, Bloedel Reserve is a garden house of 700+ acres, composed of a beautiful French style house, a Japanese garden, a gorgeous and well-remained french garden, hundreds kinds of trees, flowers and birds. We had a pleasant stroll around the reserve, and was totally impressed with how much effort Mr. & Mrs. Bloedel put in this beautiful residence.

What surprised us the most was a pair of bald eagles that are nesting on the top branch of one of the big trees facing the resident house. The housekeeper told us that eagles usually have a nesting tree and a viewing tree. When they come back home, they usually perch on the viewing tree to observe the surroundings and then fly back home. Here is a picture of the eagle sitting on its viewing tree.

Bald eagles are the elblem of the United States. They went nearly extinct in the 80s, because people were hunting them for their beautiful white tipped feathers. The number of bald eagles seems to have come back quite a bit. We even saw them twice on the Seattle highway. I really like to watch this giant bird, gliding across the sky, displaying a gesture of freedom up there.

3. Whale watching from BED! Yes, from the bed of the hotel room in Langley. Neither Robert nor I knew that gray whales sometimes show up in the Sound water right in front of our hotel room. When Robert looked out of the window from our hotel bed on Sunday morning at 8:00am, I heard a shout "Jesus, what is it? Look. I think that's a whale." Following his finger, I looked out and saw a big triangled fin only 20-30 feet away. We could hardly believe in our eyes. That was a playful gray whale, digging in the sand along the beach and tipping one of the fins out of the water. We saved $75 dollar/person on getting on a whale watching boat and watching whales from far far away. How cool is that! Here are some pictures of the big fish.

4. Natalie driving 30 miles on the island. Wahoo! My spanking new intruction permit came right in time. I enjoyed sitting behind the wheel, driving at 60 miles an hour for 2 hours and a half. My darling husband, however, had a nerve-racking time. He was so responsible, didn't take his eyes away from the road for a second and kept on instructing me
- "Staying on your side of the road",
- "use some brake", "use more brake", "more!!"
...
Apparently, it's more tiring watching me driving than Robert driving himself :)


BTW, the spring came on Mar. 20th. So happy spring, everyone!