Karla's Blog

August 27, 2021

Ahhhhhh. Finally! It wasn’t in the 100s, 90s, or even 80s in Blaine. It was in the 70s most days. That’s our kind of temps ;-D. Blaine is a very small town in the NW corner of Washington. You could look it up but I’ll make it easier for you with this map. If you find Vancouver Island in the upper left corner and look east across the water, just below the Canadian border, you will find Blaine, a cute little town of less than 6,000 people.

Blaine is known as “The Peace Arch City”. There is an arch that has one leg in Blaine and the other in Canada. Simple and symbolic.

You can see the arch in this pic, with the flags.

When we took the boys out for a walk we noticed copious amounts of seagull poo and crushed shells on the streets and sidewalks. What is this, we wondered. Apparently the vast numbers of seagulls fish for shelled critters and then take them away to eat. They leave the shells which then get crushed by cars and foot traffic. Took us a couple of days to figure that out. The seagulls are quite a presence in Blaine, especially near the marina.

They woke us every morning with their loud squawking and screeching. One would sit on a light pole right by the motel parking lot and YAK, YAK, YAK at 5:00 am. I imagine the locals don’t even hear it but, for me, never having lived near water it took a little getting used to. We used to have a rooster but this was like having 50! LOL

The neighborhood around us was, like most middle class neighborhoods, a mixed bags of nice, well kept properties, and run down, unkempt properties with some businesses and churches sprinkled throughout. 

We got a kick out of this resident’s signs.

We noticed that the majority of lawns in the neighborhood were dead or dying and wondered why. We asked and were told that they hadn’t had rain in Blaine for 50 days, which was unheard of! Apparently most folks don’t have irrigation systems for their lawns because it rains enough that they’re not needed. What a shame.

Downtown Blaine is soo cute. It’s basically one street with about 5 or 6 blocks of shops, restaurants, etc.

We ate a couple of times at this seafood place with nice outdoor seating and great food!

And, of course, there is a Starbucks which we don’t normally patronize but we had a few gift cards we needed to use ;-).

Then there was The Vault Wine Bar & Bistro, which we didn’t get the chance to try :-(.

We did get take-out from the local Vietnamese restaurant. I didn’t get a picture but the food was excellent! Love me some Vietnamese food!

One evening we went to Paso Del Norte, a local Mexican restaurant. 

It was a wonderful 72 degrees so we sat in the outdoor patio. 

We were the only ones out there though. Inside the restaurant was packed. We asked our server why nobody else was outside and he said “They’re not used to this heat!” WHAT???? 72 degrees?? We cracked up. Our server was great, and funny! The evening view from the patio wasn’t bad either.

The next morning, while on my walk, I saw the most unusual and beautiful sky . . .

What a masterpiece!

The day before we left Blaine we decided to hop a small ferry (16-20 cars) over to Lummi Island, one of the multitude of small islands in the area. On the way over we managed to get a “front row seat” LOL.

Look at this tiny little ferry. Isn’t it cute? This was while we were waiting for it.

Lummi island was small and, due to construction, we couldn’t drive all the way around. We got only so far and had to turn back. Although beautiful, there wasn’t anything really unusual or spectacular about the island, except for this beauty that was grazing in someone’s yard.

Believe it or not, on the return ferry ride we again got a front row seat! Lucky us!

What a fun day 😀

To be continued . . .