Category Archives: Orcas

The wonderful island we live on

Stormy Seas

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sIMG_1218 sIMG_1220 sIMG_1222 sIMG_1223The locals keep telling us it’s going to snow, and it excites them like some combination of impending doom and fantastical magic.  Then, in the sky, one snowflake out of a thousand raindrops materializes and falls to the ground.  “Look, it’s snowing!”  Sorry guys, that’s not what snow is.  Most of these snowflakes [sic] melt before they hit Earth.  The remainder melt on contact.  I know it’s early in the season, but that’s not snow and we have yet to see anything even remotely resembling snow.

For one, our house is too close to sea level, and we don’t have the cold air that comes with altitude.  In fact, we get a whole different weather pattern on our side of the island.  Sometimes it’s cold out here and you go to town and it’s nice and warm out.  Or it’s pleasant here and there’s a storm in town.

Last month we had some pretty high winds.  Amazingly enough, our house doesn’t blow out to sea, but it feels like it should.  The winds howl all night, shaking the trees and pouring a billion pine needles into our gutters.  The seas got pretty choppy one day and I snapped the pics above.  Not a lot of boats out in that water.

When you meet the turkeys on the road…

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sIMG_0324 sIMG_0325Okay, so I know what you’re supposed to do when you meet the Buddha on the road.  Not sure about turkeys.

It’s a family of six.  Four of them were newborns earlier this year.  They always hang out in the same area, usually along the road or in peoples’ front yards.  Sometimes they fly up onto someone’s roof.  Yes, they can fly, though not far.  I’ve seen them fly up about 20 feet and take roost in a tree.

They all survived thanksgiving, which was a bit surprising but we’re glad they did.  They’re fun to have around.  They’re not the brightest things on the road, and in a way they remind me of tourists.  You pull your truck up to them and it takes them a minute to figure out that they need to move or they’ll get run over.  Kind of like people crossing the street in Denver.

I’m Dreaming of a Dark Christmas

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I’m dreaming of a dark Christmas
Just like the ones on Orcas Isle
Of snow, not a hint
and everyone must squint
to try to see the ferry once in a while

I’m dreaming of a pitch black Christmas
Like a cave, it’s unlit and pristine
Our nights are aphotic
The sun, we’ve forgot-ic
When it sets every night at 4:15

I’m dreaming of a wet Christmas
As rain patters on my window
May your days be soaked
And your nights be cloaked
With rain and winds that blow

I can see Jupiter from my house.

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IMG_1212Screw Russia.

I finally got a remote clicker for my camera.  That means I can take long exposure shots without having to touch the camera.  Which means the camera doesn’t wobble when I take a picture.  You see, when I would usually take a pic of the night sky, I would have to touch the camera which makes it wobble a bit and the image would come out fuzzy.

Well, now, the image still comes out fuzzy because every time the wind blows the camera moves just a little bit.  Oh well. But the images are a little crisper.  IMG_1210

It’s really amazing out here how much of the night sky you can see.  It’s pitch black outside, and on those rare clear nights you can see thousands of stars.  It’s pretty neat.

The camera didn’t capture it very well, but I could very clearly see Jupiter and three of its moons up there.  Jupiter is the third brightest object in the night sky, second only to the sun and the moon.  If you look up and see a really bright yellow dot among a bunch of dim dots, chances are that’s it.

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Boat Full of Trees

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There’s this little marina just out of Anacortes that has an old boat with trees growing out of it.  There’s really no place to pull over for a good picture so I snapped these on the drive by.  It’s like a big planter box.

Nature takes things back faster than you think.  If we stopped taking care of this house, pretty soon it would have trees growing out of it too. 

Cats, garage, moon, et cetera.

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The View

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We didn’t move here because of this lovely claptrap house that sits on the hill.  We didn’t buy this place because we want to spend the next two years skinning our knuckles while repairing the splintery deck.  Nor do we particularly enjoy stepping on carpenter ants in the bathroom.  Or the crappy wood paneling that covers every surface like wallpaper.

No.  We moved here to look out our window and see the ocean.  To go outside and smell it in the wind.  To not have to get up at the crack of butt cheese just so we can miss heavy traffic on the way to work in the morning.  There are no traffic lights on Orcas Island, because there really is no traffic.  Once I went to the grocery store and there were two cars in front of me and one behind.  That’s about as heavy as it gets.

This is what we see when we look out the window.  The water has distinct textures and color that doesn’t always come out in a photograph.  Sometimes it’s glassy, sometimes it’s choppy, sometimes you can follow the currents and waves as they roll across.  Sunrises are pure gold.  Sunsets are a tapestry of gemstones.  Every night, you can hear the waves crash on the shore.