On our adventure day last week, Tom and I headed to Lopez Island with Johnny and Val.  If you are walking-on the interisland ferry, there is no charge.  A great deal!  So we decided to take our bikes and get around Lopez Island by bicycling.  After all, we heard Lopez Island was the flattest of all the islands in the San Juan archipelago.

Lopez Island may be the flattest of all the islands, but that doesn’t mean it is flat.  In fact, it felt like one very long hill after another.  We worked hard to ride up and then enjoyed coasting down the other side.  Then we would ride up again and coast again.  We repeated this process most of the day.

The four of us took the 11:35 ferry from Friday Harbor to Lopez.  We stopped at Orcas Island and at Shaw Island before we reached Lopez Island, so it took almost 90 minutes to get to Lopez.  Once we got there, we headed up the largest and longest hill on the island.  It was a good warm-up!

We rode around the northeast corner of the island on Port Stanley Road.  The reason we visited Lopez was to go to Island Fibers (more on that tomorrow) so that was our first stop.  After spending some time there, we went to Lopez Village.  The entire island only has 2,500 residents and half of them live in the village.  There are several restaurants, a library, one church, one grocery store, a few other stores, a couple of bed and breakfasts, and a big harbor.

We heard that Holly B’s had the best cinnamon rolls in the state of Washington so we headed there first.  It is a nice little bakery and was very popular at 3 p.m.  The bakery closes at 4, so for the last hour they sell everything at a 2 for 1 price.  Each of us got a whole cinnamon roll and they looked delicious.  We figured we earned them after all the ups and downs getting there.  They were good, but if they are the best in the state, that doesn’t say much for cinnamon rolls in Washington!

We rode down to the beach and watched the tide come into the harbor.  Tides are pretty high here (13 feet difference between low and high) and they come into the harbors fast!  We watched several boats ride “the rapids” as they came into the harbor.  Monday was warm (70) and sunny so it was a perfect day to spend some time on the pebbly beach.

We went back to town and had an early supper at Bucky’s Lopez Island Grill.  The restaurant is small but the food was very good.

Then we headed back to the ferry landing:  uphill and down, and up and down, and . . . you get the picture.

We had a great day on Lopez Island and would definitely go there again.  The rural beauty and laid-back atmosphere make it a good place to ride bikes and hang out for a day.