In this summer of van life, we've gotten to do some pretty incredible things: Some of them have made it onto the blog, but most haven't because, well, we've been busy doing those things. But on the 4th of August we had a day that we'll remember forever. And while I want to talk all about it, I can't show photos of the most magical part, because there aren't any.
Shall we dive in?
When loosely planning our summer, we had no intention of spending almost 3 weeks in Washington. There are three national parks near Seattle (Mt. Rainier, Olympic, and North Cascades), but we figured that most of our summer would be spent in the Glacier/Teton/Yellowstone part of the country. We were wrong. At some point, Seattle entered our minds, and the allure of the national parks + the opportunity to go whale watching (something we did a few years ago in Monterey, California, where we saw a few humpbacks) proved too strong to resist.
We booked a whale watch tour out of the town of Anacortes, about 90 minutes north of Seattle, to start at 11:00 a.m. on the 4th. It struck us as a little weird to start so late in the morning, as almost all wildlife viewing tours in all places start early. They say animals are most active at dawn and dusk, more or less regardless of what the animal is, but whatever. After sleeping in a decidedly sketchy rest stop the night before, we had no trouble getting to the marina...about 75 minutes early.
Turns out we didn't consider the obvious about starting at 9:00 a.m. near Seattle. Fog. We parked about 100 feet from the water and couldn't see it. But who cares? The tour would start and the fog would burn off, probably. Right?
Right. But only after about 25 minutes of going 40 MPH on a boat through a laughably thick fog. We did see a couple harbor seals on the way out of the docks, but that was it until we reached Deception Pass and Strawberry Island, where seals were plentiful. We also spotted a few bald eagles at various points, which is always a treat.
About 90 minutes into the tour, one of the guides - a young woman named Meg, who we were both instantly drawn to for some unknown reason - walked past us and said "I just saw a blow ahead if you wanna go grab a seat up front. It'll probably be 10 minutes."
Sure enough, a pod of orcas were cruising along the coast of Camano Island. Five of them, including a young male with a nearly 6-foot dorsal fin, were just...slowly looking for food together.
So for about 30-45 minutes we just watched this pod. They didn't exactly *do* that much, but it was just...magical. At one point they disappeared for several minutes and everyone just kind of looked around, wondering where they might pop up. To my delight, after being off the left side of the boat at about 75 yards for the entire time, two of them popped up about 75 feet off the right side, which is where I was standing. The sound of the breath is just so cool.
Thoroughly satisfied - especially considering the previous few outings for the crew had resulted in no-whale days - we sat up front and enjoyed our ride back through previously unseen waters. Not because we were going a different direction, but because the fog had lifted. We spotted a few more bald eagles and chatted with Meg about what we ought to do while in the area.
As it turns out, among other similarities with us, she had done van life for a bit and had suggestions on places to go, to sleep, and to visit at specific times. Chief among them was a placed called Teddy Bear Cove for bioluminescence.
WHAT
Bioluminescent water is one of those things that you occasionally see on the internet but have a hard time believing is real. The photos tend to look like this. Ethereal blues that show up every time a wave crashes or water is disturbed. But a keen observer will note that those images are extremely over-exposed and show super unrealistic levels of light from elsewhere, meaning that reality isn't just waves of blue.
(Oh, of note, bioluminescence in this case is caused by a type of teeny-tiny plankton that emits light when disturbed.)
So OK. Now we knew what we were gonna do that night, but night was 6 hours away and we only needed to travel about 30 minutes to get there. We went to a nearby state park and hiked a little, but we were low on energy and didn't get a ton out of the experience. As such we decided to head toward Teddy Bear Cove at like 7:00 and just...wait. We took books and chairs and just sat up on a ledge as the sun faded. It was really a lovely evening.
Sunset was at about 8:45, but obviously twilight lasts for a while after that. 9:30 rolled around and we didn't see anything. 10:00 came and went too. It was fully dark now. No moon, just stars and darkness.
We were expecting what we saw in the photos - small waves crashing in vivid blues - but we kept seeing nothing. Some people got in the water and made some yipping and/or excited sounds, but it mostly just seemed like it was because the water in the Puget Sound averages about 58 degrees in August and that's, you know, cold. Especially at night when the air is not warm.
At 10:15 we started to wonder if we were just gonna miss it. We decided that if nothing happened by 11:00 we'd bail.
A few minutes later we moved to the other side of the little promontory that made Teddy Bear Cove, where more people were just kind of hanging out. The water was calmer, so there was nothing to see as far as waves splashing blue.
But then some people got in the water.
Shrieks of joy came out of them. They were baffled by what they were seeing! It must be light! But we couldn't see it from where we were sitting. Was it subdued? Was it not really happening? We didn't know, but the people dove in and started swimming out into the darkness, laughing and shouting.
We popped up off the sand and started kicking around in the water, and there's just no way to describe how surreal it became. The water just...glowed. It glowed white, not blue. But every time you kicked your feet, it glowed around your foot. It splashed white. And just as soon as it lit up, it faded.
We stomped around in the shallows for several minutes, and each time someone came out of the water they said the same thing: "You have to get in. It's so much cooler in the deeper water."
I was reluctant, to say the least. I was already cold, didn't have a swimsuit or towel, didn't have water sandals or crappy shoes, and how could it actually be that much different in the water? Jenna, on the other hand, was basically saying "I'm getting in. You're gonna be pissed if you don't. Loser." (She didn't actually call me a loser but she did with her heart. I deserved it.)
She's usually right about this kind of stuff, so we stripped down naked and stepped into the water. Yes there were people around, but it was super dark so no one could really see your nudity - in fact, one of the women who suggested we go in and that it's fine to go naked confessed that she was standing next to us topless when we first interacted. We had no idea.
I had some struggles once I was knee deep because, again, cold, but Jenna lunged into the water and was more or less speechless with wonder. I did the same and after exactly one swim-stroke I exclaimed "OH MY GOD THIS IS ENTIRELY WORTH THE COLD."
In the title of this post I refer to this experience as indescribable. The closest thing we can come up with is kind of like this...imagine you're floating in space, but space isn't far away. Space is all around you. The stars are high above, and your body is just kind of floating in the darkness, nowhere at all. But then you move and suddenly shooting stars are all around you. Every time you move any part of your body, it stirs up shooting stars. They glow for a moment all around your body, then they disappear when you stop. Move? Shooting stars everywhere. Stop? Darkness.
So you keep moving. And you keep stirring up stars. And they shine all around you for the briefest moment, and like a real shooting star, every once in a while you'll get ones that linger for a full second or two and seem to defy reality.
Indescribable. Beautiful beyond words. If you ever get the chance, do this.
But bring a swimsuit and a towel and a sweatshirt.
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