Lopez Island in the San Juans

In September three of us, would make the adventure to the island of Lopez. This had been the home of cousin Sharon whom we lost to her passing last December. Sharon lived here for about seven years in the 70's, we all talked about getting up there to see this place where she lived and loved so much, but we never did until now. We all know now why she loved it so much. The island is a very layed back, slow moving, friendly island. I just wanted to share some of the highlights of our trip. Enjoy.
A 6:00am departure for the ferrie ride to Lopez Island had to be early so we could make the right ferrie time. Kathy drove which was a real treat for me, thank you Kathy.
This photo was taken in 1976 when Sharon and Jim were building this home, over the years it has had some changes as you will see below.
This is the Rustic Elegance Vacation home now, it was very comfortable and somehow I think we all felt Sharon's presence here. You can click on the name for more information about renting this wonderful little home.
There were a lot of very unique types of mail boxes, this was one of my favorites, we also saw many "eggs for sale" signs, I think I took nine different photos of them.
We saw lots of different animals on the island including this cow, does any one know what kind of cow he is? He was very friendly.
We are off to play at The Farmer's Market, I wonder what we will find.
I am ready to go to the Saturday Farmer's Market, don't you think?
Here is Donna in the community garden behind the sweet peas, if you look close behind on the fence you can see and orb, um was that Sharon's angel? Donna took a picture of me in a different spot in the garden and I had orb in my photo. It does make you think. Now we are off for coffee.
This coffee shop was quite interesting, notice on the door it says "hippies use the side door" I was reading some information on the walls that stated that this place has been here since the early 70's, I have to think that Sharon probably frequented this establishment.
One of our adventures took us to Flat Point, in search of sea glass, not to much was found, however.
This was one of the winding path ways down to Flat Point, the fall leaves were falling every where.
This driftwood fort was common along the beaches, I really liked this one as you can see it is secured with seaweed.
This crab I found on the beach so I did a little staging, he was not alive, I am glad I did the staging because he did not make it back to the car in one piece.
This photo was taken at Sharks Reef Sanctuary, it was by far our favorite place to hike out to, I do believe this probably was one of Sharon's special places to go, as she had told me some stories about a place similar to this. The dog in the picture belonged to the woman who offered to take the photo, his name was "moon". I loved it.
This was a farm stand that we stopped at, inside this building they had freezers full of USDA approved meat for purchase, all you did was write down what you want on a piece of paper, put the money with it and put it in a box and take your meat home. A total honor system on this island, wow!
Just when I thought I could not hike any more, Kathy convinced me that we needed to hike out to Iceberg Point, which we did, this was a monument that declares the Canadian and US waters.
Donna, Kathy and I with the bay behind us, we were down at the Village Shopping area. There is not a lot to shop for here, so you were able to really relax and just enjoy the scenery.
This story was on the back of a post card we got, it tells the whole story about Lopez, if you click on the photo it will enlarge so that you can read it.
Our search for agates was not so successful, however I did find several heart shape rocks, um I wander if that was Sharon's way of telling us we were loved and missed, I know we all miss her very much. Sharon was one of our traveling buddies, I would have to say she brought a lot of laughs out of us. the stories she could tell, oh my. She will never leave our hearts.