The San Juan Islands of northern Washington State are my main kayak stomping ground. Over the years, I’d visited just about every place there, but until now, I’d never actually explored the main island itself.
When I was a less-experienced kayaker, the long distances between campsites on the west side of the island put me off. When I become a slightly more-experienced kayaker, I focused on more exotic destinations. Somehow, the main island always got missed.
Late one summer though, I finally visited the long-overlooked San Juan Island, and boy, am I glad I did.
Route map. Just for fun, I threw in a three-quarter circumnavigation of Shaw Island, as well.
The wildlife was terrific, as it always is in the San Juans. I saw fifty-five species of bird, including all three cormorants, plus seven mammals: harbor seal, Steller sea lion, river otter, mink, raccoon, mule deer, and orca (killer whale).
Even in August, it was apparent that winter was coming upon us, despite what the still-blistering hot, sunny days may have been trying to convince us. The loons and marbled murrelets were already mostly transitioned to their winter plumage; the bushtits were flocking, and the dunlin, black-bellied plovers, and black turnstones were already foraging on our shores.
Yet it wasn’t quite time yet to break out the down jackets. The weather on this trip was superb: sunny skies, calm seas, and long, hot days. With six days for this trip, I was able to spend plenty of time ashore, sitting out in the sun or strolling through the woods.
Being out in nature is what I enjoy most about kayaking—the actual kayaking part is just a means to an end.
Pelagic and Brandt’s cormorants. In most parts of Washington, these species are quite shy, but here at the Anacortes ferry terminal, they posed for photographs with their young.
Rounding Reef Point, San Juan Island. At this northeasternmost point, the island tapers to a string of low rocks.
Overlook on Turn Island. Turn Island is owned by the US Fish and Wildlife Service and is part of the San Juan Islands National Wildlife Refuge, but camping has been allowed since 1959 under an MOU with Washington State Parks.
Forest on Turn Island. Raccoons on this island chewed holes in all my water jugs, forcing me to detour to Friday Harbor for replacements.
Hiking on Turn Island. The air in the forest was still and hot, for the most part, but there were openings in the canopy along the shoreline that admitted cool sea breezes.
A wilderness trip this was certainly not. The San Juans always have a lot of boat traffic, so much so that my dad once joked that there must exist a county ordinance that “at least one motor shall be audible at all times and in all places in the islands.” In the fall and winter, I usually get the actual campsites to myself, but on this summer trip, there was at least one other person on each island and campsite where I stopped.
Although I prefer solitude, meeting other people wasn’t the end of the world. A kayaker I met on Turn Island told me he had once circumnavigated San Juan Island in a single day. I told him I was taking a week. Out of politeness, he pretended to think my way of paddling was more fun than his, but I suspect that, for a gung-ho type like him, my pace might have seemed boring. I spend my time looking at birds and trees and drifting along with the current. He spends his time racking up mile after mile of aerobic exercise.
That’s his loss, because when you take the time to explore, you can find some cool stuff. The rainshadow from Vancouver Island promotes some unusual tree species in the San Juans. I found lots of grand fir, one of my favorite tree species but one I rarely get to see this side of the Cascades. Other dry climate specialists I found were Garry oak, Pacific yew, and of course, the madrones (arbutus) for which the islands are famous.
Most of my campsites were on islands other than San Juan itself. With so much time on my hands, I poked around Shaw Island, camping at the one park on that island, and visited Blind Island off the north side of Shaw. Every spot on Blind Island was taken. Some youth group had paddled there in giant fiberglass canoes. I always like seeing the various crazy watercraft people come up with.
I also visited Yellow Island, which is entirely owned by the Nature Conservancy. They allow day use visitors but no camping. I admire them for their conservation efforts, but I question whether simply buying up habitat is the most effective means of conserving it. Buying Yellow Island must have cost the Nature Conservancy a tremendous sum of money, yet the amount of habitat protected by the purchase is quite small.
If our main plan is to purchase all the wild areas in the world we want to save, we might be in trouble. I think it’s more effective to lobby governments and courts to set aside natural areas, because the acreage that can be protected by government action is so much bigger than in private actions like the purchase of Yellow Island. But I do admit, I am glad Yellow Island houses a nature preserve now instead of summer homes for the wealthy.
Canoes on Blind Island. Most of the tribes in the Puget Sound/San Juans region have started canoe programs in recent decades.
Landing on Yellow Island. The Nature Conservancy owns this spectacular island but allows day visitors.
Hiking on Yellow Island. It sure would be great to be the caretaker out here.
East end of Yellow Island. There were a wide variety of habitats in a small area, including forests, fields, and a sand spit much beloved by ducks and gulls.
Caretaker’s driftwood cabin on Yellow Island. The only permitted landing beach was on the south shore.
Arriving at Jones Island. This island was so jammed with the summertime crowd I was lucky to find a campsite.
Hiking around Jones Island. This is one of my favorites of the San Juan Islands, although I usually prefer to visit in winter.
Garry oak on Jones Island. The County and State are making big efforts to revive this fire-dependent species, the only oak native to Washington.
View from Jones Island. Visible from left to right are Vancouver, Moresby, Saltspring, Sentinel, Spieden, Stuart, Cactus, Johns, South Pender, Flattop, and Saturna Islands.
Young buck on Jones Island. Hunting is forbidden in this state park, and as a result, the deer have become so tame you can almost pet them.
A word of caution for future kayak visitors to the area: Posey Island State Park’s campsites, unlike all other public kayak-campsites in the San Juans, are reservable. If all the campsites are full, you must move on, so call ahead. For this reason, I didn’t get to camp on Posey, but I did stop by for lunch, and it was a lovely spot. I promised myself to return in the fall after the crowds died down, although I did not actually return to Posey until spring 2017.
Down the west side of San Juan Island, I spotted a family of around fifteen orcas from our resident J-pod. The pod was visible from a distance of over a mile, because one of the juveniles kept leaping bodily out of the water, and the splashes he made as he landed could be seen from a long ways off.
The pod also made a thunderous breathing noise, audible from at least half a mile away, as they cruised up the coast of the island, looking for salmon swimming between Juan de Fuca and the Fraser River. They swam past close that at one point, I was backpaddling furiously out of fear that they might collide with me! If they didn’t swim under my kayak, they must have swum right in front of it. It was the coolest whale encounter I’d ever had.
Sunset at San Juan County Park. The kayak campsite here is up a long flight of stairs from the landing beach.
Lime Kiln Point lighthouse, 100 years old this year. Supposedly there is a pictograph in the vicinity, the only known pictograph in western Washington, although I have never been able to find it.
Orca in Haro Strait. The lead adult male passed quite some distance away. The others came much closer.
Small family of orcas pass in front of kayak. Groups of two or three whales often synchronized their breathing.
Adult and juvenile orca in Haro Strait. Biologists can identify individual whales by their colorations.
Young orca full-body breach. This is the orca equivalent of a “cannonball.”
Southwest coast of San Juan Island. This expansive plain is a great place to look for foxes.
Cattle Point lighthouse from Haro Strait. Currents off the point can be dangerous, and the wind exposure is high.
Early morning in Griffin Bay. Griffin Bay State Park is so obscure the Parks and Recreation Commission does not even list it on its website.
The San Juans in the summer prove that you don’t have to go far or be off by yourself somewhere in order to have a first-rate nature experience. Anyone who wants to can see as much wildlife and plant life as they want, and if you go slowly enough—say, taking six days to do a trip some people do in one—you can see a lot of beautiful things. These kinds of adventures, as much adventures of the imagination as anything else, are available to all of us if we want them.
—Alex Sidles