Lynden, WA

The guy in red is a sculpture across the street from our local Blaine, WA post office. Don't have any more information on 'red man.'

We remain in Birch Bay and in fact we just decided to extend our stay here for a few days and not go next to Cultus Lake in BC. We drove up to TT-Cultus Lake today to preview the park and the area is just stunning with a large beautiful lake nearby and a resort like feel. However, the park itself has small driveways and cramped parking spaces. There is some question about whether we would be able to find an open space that would work for our rig. This park is more geared for campers and smaller RV's.

We are now going to stay here in Birch Bay for four extra days and then go to TT-Crescent Bar Resort in Quincy, WA for about five days before running up to Kelowna, BC on August 5th as originally planned. For anyone who has never done it before, park scheduling requires the talents of a choreographer to make sure that mail can be forwarded, hot weather is avoided, and that you do not arrive at a park on a weekend when working people have taken all the good spaces. Crescent Bar is directly south of Kelowna off of Route 97, so it will be straight shot up to visit Robb and Joe.

Another small variable is the fire situation in Kelowna. The news media here in the states haven't been covering it, but the Kelowna area has been dealing with three different large fires over the last week. Two of the fires are now contained, but the third and largest one is still fully uncontained. The fire is northwest of Kelowna and shouldn't be a factor, but it is fire season so we are watching the situation carefully.

Last Wednesday we took the rig down to Bellingham to get our two awning problems resolved. Can't say enough good about Al's RV Parts and Service in Bellingham. They are right adjacent to I-5. They did a good job on both problems in less than two hours and bill was reasonable in both time and rate.

On a separate scenic drive, we found a really nice town nearby called Lynden. According to the local literature about 50% of the inhabitants are Dutch which would explain why the town has a feel similar to Solvang, CA. The homes and landscaping in this town are so well maintained that it's hard to believe that they go through the same winter weather as the rest of Washington. They also seem to have an unlimited budget for 'color bowl's of flowers to complete the 'Wisteria Lane' atmosphere.

I had Strawberry/Rhubarb pie ala mode at a Lynden bakery that has to be the best pie I've ever eaten. It was so 'rich' that I had to forego dinner. Chuck had Brambleberry that was good, but not as good as mine.

In the weather department, we have had mostly sun, a few clouds and the closest thing to rain was a brief drizzle a couple of evenings ago that we almost didn't even notice. We are supposed to have a major warm up the first of next week which is part of the reason we are staying here a few more days. Inland areas are going to be near 100 degrees the first of the week and we've forgotten what that feels like.

I've uploaded a few pictures from Lynden that can be seen here.