Roche Harbor & Lime Kiln Biking Day:
38.02 miles, 2417 ft ascent, 8 hrs. 15 min.
Daily Drena: Balance
Today started with an early wake-up call from the 8:00 ferry blowing it’s horn as it left the harbor, but we managed to roll over and go back to sleep, so it ended up being a lazy morning. We didn’t manage to load up the bikes and get started until 10:12am, which we realized was poor timing as the next ferry was just arriving, but oh well!
Our main destination of the day in the north was Roche Harbor, but there were lots of stops on the way for interesting things we just found along the side of the road. My favorite was a lovely little cove and overlook at Reuben Tarte Park, and even though the bike back up and out was extremely steep it was definitely worth it.
We stopped in at the San Juan Island Sculpture Park and toured the grounds for a bit. It covers 20 acres, but I feel like we were able to see a good portion of it before our stomachs made us move on to lunch in Roche Harbor at the Lime Kiln Cafe which is right on the dock. Roche Harbor is a small little resort town which is known for art, so Lorena was able to walk around the little art fair that was going on, while I sat across from what seemed to be the tiniest post office in the world.
Next up was English Camp to attempt to get more information on this pig war. So, basically what happened is that the English and the USA had both stakes claims to the islands and established a treaty defining the “channel” separating Vancouver Island and from the mainland as one of the lines of the treaty defining territories. However, there are actually two channels, Haro Strait nearest Vancouver Island and Rosario Strait nearer the mainland. The San Juan Islands are between these two channels, so both sides claimed them as their territory. The English’s Hudson Bay Company (HBC) established a farm in the area and some Americans later resided on the island and an uneasy peace ensued. This ended on June 15, 1859 when an HBC pig rooted around in an American’s garden, so he shot it. Navies and armies from both nations were sent in response to encamp on the island. Instead of hostilities occurring, cooler heads prevailed (mainly due to a British Admiral not wanting to start a war over a pig), and a peaceful joint military occupation lasted until 1871 when it was ruled that the islands belonged to the United States.
History lesson aside, we also saw many signs all over the island regarding whether library services should be voted in during the upcoming election cycle … which way will this war end …
We then took a rest at the San Juan County Park, enjoying the views and a snack, while looking for, but not finding any whales.
More whale hunting was undertaken at the Lime Kiln Point State Park. We learned that lime from limestone was a large export of the islands, as it was used in the production of steel, plaster, cement, and paper. It is also extremely reactive with water, producing heat, and even knowing this they tried to offload the lime directly onto ships next to the quarry via a rickety dock until they lost a newly built schooner in 1875 and decided it was better to ship it overland.
Our last stop of the day was at False Bay, which provided a lovely view of farmland and water.
We have discovered two issues we have with the island so far: 1) Restaurants do not stay open late enough, so we have had to scrounge for food, and 2) They are very much against bikes on trails as everywhere we look there are “no bikes” signs even though the trails are easily bikeable and wide enough for all users. Oh, and we saw a sea lion or seal right outside of our Airbnb while we were eating our dinner.
