I’ve got a brain teaser for you. What is the best time you’ve ever had on a bike ride? Was it your first century, an epic mountain bike trek, or maybe a great ride on a deserted trail with your buddies?
I’ve been on a lot of rides that could qualify as my favorite but there is one that stands above the rest.
My all time favorite ride occurred a couple of months ago on a milestone wedding anniversary. I’m fortunate enough to have a wife that likes to ride with me and as icing on the cake she actually wanted to go on a bike ride for our wedding anniversary. Oh yeah how rare is that!
For our Anniversary, once we got the kids off to school we headed over to Anacortes and took a ferry to Lopez Island. This is one of my favorite places to ride, I’m not really sure why but it is. There’s just something cool about riding your bike onto a ferry and tying it up to the side of the boat. Once our bikes were secured we went upstairs and rode in the warm comfort of the ferry cabin.
Yummy Goodness
The first destination we headed to when we landed on Lopez was Holly B’s Bakery. It’s only a couple of miles down the road but worth it. I’ve talked about this place before but if you haven’t been there it’s a must. Lots of yummy pastries and all natural ingredients. Jenny and I both had a cinnamon roll. Now there’s some good cycling fuel. We sat on the benches outside for a while just relaxing and taking in the sights.
Deserted Roads
Once we finished our goodies we headed out to do some exploring. We were there on a Wednesday before the summer rush so the traffic was at a minimum. We rode out past the golf course and airport to a hiking trail. When we got there we pulled out the map that we had and chose where we would go next. We decided to head over the other end of the island to a beach. Since there wasn’t any traffic we were able to ride in the middle of the road side by side for miles on end. This was great.
Eagle sighting
While we were riding to the other side of the island we rode past a pond on someone’s farm. As I looked over I noticed that there were 6 or 7 bald eagles sitting on the edge of the pond. As we rode by most of them took off and flew up to some trees on the other side of the farm. It was quite the site. We stood in the road for a while waiting for them to fly back so we could get some pictures but they were smarter than that. Finally we snapped what pictures we could and head on. That’s definitely something you don’t see every day.
I’ve been on a lot of rides that could qualify as my favorite but there is one that stands above the rest.
My all time favorite ride occurred a couple of months ago on a milestone wedding anniversary. I’m fortunate enough to have a wife that likes to ride with me and as icing on the cake she actually wanted to go on a bike ride for our wedding anniversary. Oh yeah how rare is that!
For our Anniversary, once we got the kids off to school we headed over to Anacortes and took a ferry to Lopez Island. This is one of my favorite places to ride, I’m not really sure why but it is. There’s just something cool about riding your bike onto a ferry and tying it up to the side of the boat. Once our bikes were secured we went upstairs and rode in the warm comfort of the ferry cabin.
Yummy Goodness
The first destination we headed to when we landed on Lopez was Holly B’s Bakery. It’s only a couple of miles down the road but worth it. I’ve talked about this place before but if you haven’t been there it’s a must. Lots of yummy pastries and all natural ingredients. Jenny and I both had a cinnamon roll. Now there’s some good cycling fuel. We sat on the benches outside for a while just relaxing and taking in the sights.
Deserted Roads
Once we finished our goodies we headed out to do some exploring. We were there on a Wednesday before the summer rush so the traffic was at a minimum. We rode out past the golf course and airport to a hiking trail. When we got there we pulled out the map that we had and chose where we would go next. We decided to head over the other end of the island to a beach. Since there wasn’t any traffic we were able to ride in the middle of the road side by side for miles on end. This was great.
Eagle sighting
While we were riding to the other side of the island we rode past a pond on someone’s farm. As I looked over I noticed that there were 6 or 7 bald eagles sitting on the edge of the pond. As we rode by most of them took off and flew up to some trees on the other side of the farm. It was quite the site. We stood in the road for a while waiting for them to fly back so we could get some pictures but they were smarter than that. Finally we snapped what pictures we could and head on. That’s definitely something you don’t see every day.
If you look closely you can see a female bald eagle sitting on the pond.
Nude beach
We continued on our way to the other side of the island to what they call a beach. In Washington what they call beaches aren’t what you would normally see in Hawaii but I guess it still qualifies as a beach. As we rode down the hill I saw a sign that said “Lycra Free Zone”. What the heck was that all about. Then I saw the following sight. The locals must have a good sense of humor. Look at this beach, I think this sign was just wishful thinking by some guy living across the street. While we were at the beach we saw some more bald eagles. There was a steady wind so some of them were trying to float in the air without flapping their wings. They could do it for a second or two but not for too long.
Gourmet Lunch
Since it was getting toward lunch time we headed back toward the village for a bite to eat before we got back on the ferry. There’s a great natural food grocery store in the village so we decided to see what we could find there. We ended up getting a small homemade loaf of wheat, oat, and nut bread and a container of chipotle cheese curd. It probably doesn’t sound very good but as we sat out on a picnic table outside the store and ate it tasted delicious. Who would have thought it?
It tasted better than it looked
Ride home
We rode back to the ferry the way we came enjoying all of the sights. After we got off the ferry in Anacortes we really didn’t want the trip to end so we stopped off for some ice cream. On the drive home on I-5 it started to rain really hard. We really timed that trip well.
Although this doesn’t sound like much of a bike ride it was perfect in my mind. We got some bike riding in, got to see some incredible sights, had some good food and I got to celebrate many great years with my favorite cycling buddy.
1 comment:
Beautiful story.
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