Puget Sound

 Puget Sound was only ever just a...'sound'...to me.  It was something far away in a place I'd never been and didn't imagine to see.

Now its' a sight, and a memory.

I've ridden one of its ferries,
crossed some of its bridges,
and seen its sunsets.

It is a pretty part of the country.

Admiralty Head Light

The Admiralty Head lighthouse is one hundred and ten years old.  From 1903 it was lit for nineteen years before it was deactivated.

It's a pretty lighthouse on the Puget Sound where a friend took me to see some sights.

Climbing the stairs gives you a very nice sight indeed:  a view of the blue, blue sea.

Fort Casey

Looking over this grassy expanse toward the Puget Sound, you wouldn't think you were looking at massive military fortifications.

That's just what the enemy was supposed to think, too.
 Fort Casey was part of the plan to protect the western sea coast from invasion. It would have worked if airplanes weren't invented.

Today it's a huge park where people have picnics, fly kites and climb on the aging structures once meant to protect us.
I suppose an invasion by sea isn't so likely anyway.

Ferry to Whidbey Island

"Take a ferry to an island."
That was another piece of advice given to me when I asked about things to do in Washington.
And so I did.  I went to Whidbey Island on the Mukilteo ferry.

Parked with all the other cars...

...and on the 20 minute ride across the bay, there was just enough time to go out on deck to see the view.

The train came by

The train tracks ran quite closely to the shoreline on Puget Sound. I thought erosion and thing like that made it not possible to be so close to the sea.

I was wrong.

And just to prove that it was an active, working railroad track:  the train came by as I stood on the bridge.

Stonehenge...ish...

Some of the gigantic cement structures around the Chambers Bay park are sort of mysterious, making a person think of Stonehenge and what that ancient place was used for.

Since it's history is much shorter, the Chambers Bay mystery is much easier solved.  The golf course and park were, once upon a time, a sand and gravel quarry.
I even found evidence of it written on this partial wall.   

The area was used as a quarry as far back as when the Steilacoom Indian Tribe and the first European settlers lived there almost two hundred years ago. The ice flows and glaciers that moved through the Puget Sound have created gravel and multi-level soil deposits, making it an ideal place for quarrying.



The land has also been used as a lumber company and a railroad center.  A little bit of its history and some photos of what it used to look like can be found on the golf site's web page.

That it used to be a quarry was also ideal for the golf course when the land was transformed into a park, because they got to move the dirt and sand around to sculpt the golf course and lookout area.
What they chose to leave behind, though, is interesting.  Maybe in another thousand years these big pillars in the middle of a park will bring up as many questions as Stonehenge.

Chambers Bay

I was sitting in an Indian restaurant in Tacoma, Washington, with a new friend who asked the waitress where her favorite place to go to see a good view over the bay was.
"Chambers Bay," the waitress answered enthusiastically, giving us first a story about how much her boyfriend also loved the location then the directions to get there.

She was right, that waitress.  Chambers Bay has a lovely sunset view.

It sure is pretty, wouldn't you agree?

I think the waitress earned her tip...even if she didn't know as much about Indian food as I do.