Skagit Roadtrip

I really have to credit a sister with encouraging today to happen. All I had to do was mention I was sort of thinking of heading to the Skagit Valley and she was ready to go! I know I am not the only one having second thoughts of any distance travel with the cost of gas but we had a great time and it was well worth it.

Nim and I both woke up tired and poorly rested. The rain broke around 5pm the night before and he and I booked it up the trail so our night was a little off. Still, you can see he is in the car and ready (sort of).

I was hopeful for the the weather. North Bend was sunny.

Then I got into Issaquah and it was completely clouded in.

Our first destination was Anacortes, which as you can see was also clouded in. There was supposed to be a Quilt Walk. I didn't do enough research on it before I left and not really sure where it was we just decided to walk the water front.

Nim got sick of sitting for photos.

And he worried about the water.


Then...on the walk back to the car we went through downtown Anacortes and figured out the quilt walk system!

Most of the quilts can't be seen from walking the street, but you look for the above Quilt Walk sign and you can enter the store and check out the quilt. I will remember this for later.

By the time we figured this out we had been walking for quite awhile and having a great time but it was time to return to the Mount Vernon area to see the Tulip Festival (it is a little early so mostly daffodils for now).

Now neither my sister or I were willing to pay admission to go into any of the gardens. But we had a good time all the same.

A few Tulips were in bloom.
And some Alpacas which we got yelled at crossing the street to go look at.

Tulips outside the garden we wouldn't pay to enter.


Another very furry Alpaca.


Anacortes was the very dog friendly section of our trip and the Tulip Festival was not. I did know that before heading up and the reviews and comments on this are not kidding. I do understand that dogs in the gardens would be chaos.

Nim was stuck to the car.

More photos on this adventure probably tomorrow. I needed to clear some of the photos with sister (even though they were all amazing she still gets right of refusal) and I think she took some photos too.

I got home flat out tired. The good news is I wasn't able to even bake half of what was planned today (which I bargained myself out of doing yesterday) so that means I can do some tomorrow.

Above is Hot Chocolate Bars (take 2). And yes, I strongly preferred them more true to recipe - far deeper chocolate. The version she does on the copy cat Reese's Peanut Butter eggs are a much lighter chocolate. These will be used towards tomorrow's recipe.


And I also made the Big Fat Coconut Breakfast Cake. I really, REALLY liked this. Basically I just did a quarter amount of the recipe, added shredded coconut and baked it for about 15 minutes in a mini loaf pan.

I had read enough reviews to know I wanted to cut the sugar by half. I was going for more of the spiced pineapple style than the pineapple sugary cake and it was perfect for me.