John Wayne Trail 2014: Day 9

Herd of elk

My next day was all about getting through Seattle. It began beautifully. After a short ride back into town, I saw a heard of elk and had a great breakfast at a truck stop. Then I continued down the Snoqualmie valley trail. There was a bit of road riding near Snoqualmie falls but I wanted to see the waterfall anyway. It was quite there because not many people were awake yet. It was also cold, but I welcomed that feeling because I knew it would not last all day long.

Yummy!

Thanks for breakfast

Snoqualmie river

Nice quiet morning

This falls generates electricity!

Continuing down the trail, I made some pretty great time! I got off just before Duvall and crossed the river at NE 124th street. After a steep hill, I came to the Tolt Pipeline trail. After days of well-graded railroad paths, the Tolt Pipeline trail was quite a shock. It is a perfectly straight trail the goes right over hill, no matter how steep. Many slopes seemed to be and 45 degree angles, or 50% grades! I avoided my front break.

Got back on-trail here

Cool converted trestle

Cruisin'

Snoqualmie river again

Heading west again

Straight trail but not flat

This hill was a bit of a death trap

I found myself in a nice park in the Bothel area. I worked my way north until I came to 112h St SW. I took it west (and Beverly Park Road) until I hit Puget sound. Had to ask some directions on the way and bought some folks lunch in return. I finally got to Mukilteo ferry. Riding the ferry is quite fun when you don't have to worry about a car! Also, it was nice to go somewhere without having to pedal my bike!

Pavement the rest of the day

Bothel offices

I-5

Helpful people

Bikes skip past traffic at the ferry

My ferry entrance

Leave bikes here

Whidbey Island

Bye, ferry!

Now up the hill through Clinton

I met a few more bikers on the ferry who were doing all of the islands in Puget Sound. That sounds like a fun trip! Maybe one day I will do that! Anyway, we were dropped off at Clinton. I stopped on the way out of town for ice cream... always a good idea. Then, I started across Whidbey island. I stopped every once in a while to eat blackberries! Eventually, I made it to the Port Townsend - Coupeville ferry. I got on the last ferry of the day and made it to Port Townsend at about dinner time.

Always a good idea

Blackberries are also a good idea

View across the sound

Tall grass

Almost there

Waiting for my second ferry

Last view from Whidbey Island

Nice color scheme

Heading back down to the bike

Hello, Port Townsend

Cool old buildings

Yummy dinner

Here, I ran into another camping problem. The entire city of Port Townsend was packed with people. I was advised not to go riding around outside of town because the highway was dangerous. So, I ended up camping in a city park without permission. This worked fine because I set up at dark and was gone by dawn. There were two unexpected happenings though. First, there was some kind of pagan ceremony going on! There were drums, and candles, ad there was dancing, and a full moon. But I don't really know what was going on because I didn't want to bother them. I just wanted to sleep. The second thing to occur was sprinklers. They came on at about 2 in the morning. Luckily, I was roused by nearby sprinklers before the one around me started spraying. So I moved camp, and slept in a dry spot.

Goodnight