RV Trip Update Week 12: Seattle, Port Angeles, & Victoria

This week we moved on out of the US of A and into Canada via the Blackball ferry. But not before we explored Seattle and Port Angeles a little.

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We pulled into a KOA just outside Port Angeles Monday afternoon. Tuesday morning we drove to the Bainbridge Island ferry terminal. There we parked our truck and walked onto the ferry heading to Seattle.

It was so inexpensive, just over $8 for an adult ticket and $4 for a child ticket (and both my 14-year-old and 16-year-old qualified for the child fare). Those tickets were return! Considering what we paid later in the week for a ride to Vancouver Island those prices were a steal. Plus we didn’t have to worry about finding parking in Seattle.

We started our one day of exploring the city with a trip to the Gum Wall located in Post Alley under Pike Place Market.

The view was a strange mix of disgusting and beautiful at the same time. No, we did not add any pieces to it as we just couldn’t imagine getting that close to all the rest of the pieces.

Next, we walked through Pike Place Market. Although I loved all the sites the vast diversity of vegetables, flowers and fish stands offered in terms of color, texture, and smell (well okay, the fish smell not so much) I didn’t like the layout of the market. It was broken up. The place was so confusing I still don’t know if we saw all of it.

The highlight of the day for all five of us was our trip to the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum. It was $22 per person, but so worth it.

Chihuly is one talented man. His glass work is an incredible mix of colors, shapes, and textures. You can view more of what we saw there in this slide of ten pictures on Instagram.

Wednesday we took it easy in the morning. I enjoyed a short run and a bit of work time while the hubby got the laundry caught up and our teens did some school work.

After lunch, we headed out to Lake Crescent and the nearby Marymere Falls trail.

Lake Crescent took my breath away; never have I seen a lake so blue and so clear. This photo on Instagram shows just how blue!

The trail to Marymere Falls was full of various shades of green. Moss grew on every tree, and the ground was covered in ferns. The trail has the coolest log bridge made of one single long log.

You could hear the roar of Marymere Falls long before you saw it. Although it was beautiful, I think I enjoyed the beauty of the trail up to it even more.

Thursday morning we got up pretty early and headed to the Black Ball Ferries to catch the ferry to Victoria. Even though we were almost 2 hours early, this is how many people were already parked (we are the Jayco with the bikes on the back)

The ferry ride over cost us just over $300 one way! YIKES. The cost was that high due to the length of our unit. We did consider leaving the RV behind for this portion of the trip, but when we added up hotel rooms and the cost of parking the RV somewhere for the two weeks, we are here it was cheaper to take it.

Friday was our first full day on my childhood home island, and we spent a good portion of it with my aunt at The Butchart Gardens.

It was good to see her after so many years. I haven’t been back to Vancouver Island since my mom passed away in my early 30s and now here I am in my early 40s.

After we said goodbye to my aunt, we went to the seaside near Sidney in hopes of finding starfish. We didn’t find any, but we did have fun exploring the shore.

Saturday we continued our search for starfish and finally, after visiting several beaches, we found them on the beach at Mount Douglas Park. And we didn’t find just one–we found at least a dozen or more!

Sunday we are heading to my sister’s for a few days. We are spending the rest of the week in Tofino, a part of Vancouver Island I have never explored before–so I am very excited to see it finally.