STARR TREKS TUESDAY MAY 26.2015 ISSAQUAH WA
It was just 235 miles from Hermiston to here, so not a bad drive. We drove past lovely scenery— huge fields of grapevines, ?peas growing on wooden supports, orchards. The mountains were pretty and looked so high, but the elevation was usually less than 4000 feet! I guess pine trees grow at a lower altitude up north. We took a circuitous way to the park, since our GPS got a little confused on street numbers— we went down streets where no RV has probably been before. We arrived at the RV park around 1:30 and we really have the best spot in the park — guess we should have a great spot since we are paying a great price— even with the Good Sam discount, it added up to $365 for a week — Larry said tax was $45!!! All the spots are asphalted with grass in between, and we even have a separate parking spot for the car just behind our spot.
After lunch, we took a walking path from the RV park into the town of Issaquah. I googled the town— population is about 34,000, tho the traffic seems like a lot more! The name came from the Native American name— Squak Valley. In the late 1800’s, it supported the mining industry, then timber. Now Boeing has an operation here, and since 1996, it has been the headquarters of Costco!! The walk to town and back was about 4 miles. We stopped at a little local theater that was putting on Cabaret— the actors were locals and the tickets were $40-50!!! We have seen Cabaret in ABQ and would’ve gone again if it were cheaper. I asked the lady at the box office if there were any areas of town with cute little shops, and she said we were there— there really were no cute little shops!
After we walked back to the RV, we got in the car and drove out to Boehm’s chocolates— I had picked up a brochure in the RV office. They had a self guided “window” tour where you could look at where they made their candy, + had little films in the windows— apparently the workers are only their till 2 pm, so we missed seeing live candy makers. One window had photos of Lucille Ball, when she had a job in the candy factory — I remember that episode well. The tour emphasized that the workers did not wear gloves at all— the temperature of the workers’ hands benefitted the consistency of the chocolate, and plastic gloves would cause it to get lumpy. So the video showed workers picking up candy filling pieces with one hand, then dipping with the other hand that was totally coated with chocolate. One video showed them making turtles, so we just had to buy a box— it will be our dessert for the next week! The guy who formed the company is Julius Boehm (1897-1981), who immigrated to the US from Austria in 1940 and opened his first candy kitchen in Seattle in 1940. They moved to Issaquah in 1956 — he built his “Edelweiss Chalet” and an Alpine chapel on the grounds. We only got to see the outside of the church, since we missed the pay tour.
We drove thru a lot of traffic back to the RV where I began studying all the tourist propaganda that I picked up in the RV office. We took a walk around the RV park — it is high 60’s, but quite humid. The RV park is built on the side of a hill— we are in the lower area, but we can’t even imagine how some of the 5th wheels got backed into their spots. Tomorrow, we plan to drive a few miles to the Park and Ride and head downtown. It will be nice to stay in the same place for the next week.
we missed out on Sarah's graduation from Kgtn in Abilene!
info on Wm Tell
No comments:
Post a Comment