Hello, Port Townsend!

My road-opening magick of September led me to braving the open highway for the first time in years, engineering a relatively smooth transition out of my old home and off to Dad's for a brief autumnal getaway. The return trip I decided to take, instead of the Seattle route, via a great destination for exploration: Port Townsend. I would join up with I-5 again after driving along Hood Canal, making a huge needle-and-eye loop, returning to Portland in time for Samhain festivities.

As usual, I was nervous in setting out, not only still new to the distance driving scene but well aware that if going via Port Townsend, I might not make the trip in one day. I stopped in Anacortes for a few snacks, well aware of my dwindling money but unable to resist a few things from the spice rack above. A deep breath, and I drove onward, toward Whidbey. . . .

It's so much easier to enjoy a view like the one at Deception Pass when you're not behind the wheel! Never mind pulling back out into traffic. Nonetheless, I did. I managed the drive and subsequent ferry ticket all right, trying to stay relaxed on the ferry ride over. Then I drove off, and right onto Water Street --- the main strip of one of only four Victorian seaports left in the nation. Time for a little sightseeing and window shopping!

Port Townsend is full of beautiful, quirky Victorian-era buildings. The town popped up about 1840 as a seaside trading hub, but its growth was halted when the railway line was built along the future I-5 corridor, via Seattle, due to the mainland convenience (Port Townsend is isolated on a peninsula). By 1890, progress by rail elsewhere had bled the town of commerce and development, effectively halting it in time. After a few dreary ghost decades, it revived as a tourist destination, but still goes quiet in winter. Following the end-of-summer Wooden Boat Festival, mind you, during which it goes absolutely bonkers with people.

This trip was my first return to Port Townsend in years. I had to be careful: Due to its history, the town knows how to capitalize on visitors; it is a veritable retro, nautical, artist's and Steampunk-lover's paradise. So many shops, all hoping for a bit of my money! Particularly with winter coming, I wanted to support every one.

Check out this Apothecary!

Laboratory Fix from a Friend

When you find yourself seeking out ways to be in a lab, including hanging out with your oldest best friend in the lab you took high school chemistry and biology in, I take it as a sign you're missing being in science.

While home with Dad, I was invited by my friend Madrona to come see the work she's doing on fish biology. It's not my specialty, but most kinds of science --- and their processes --- I find interesting. Madrona is passionate about the ecological health of the San Juans, where she was born, and about preserving the species of the Islands and surrounding Salish Sea. The Puget Sound area as a whole is beautiful and unique, and therefore its ecosystem is fragile in distinct ways.

The lab work being undertaken by Kwiaht this week (likely longer) revolves around genetics, namely those of the sand lance. This tiny fish, oft overlooked, is critical: It's right in the centre of the food chain. The health of salmon and other populations depend upon it. By studying sand lance genetics, Madrona hopes to answer key questions: Where are these fish coming from, in terms of different places in Puget Sound? Where are they breeding, and with which other groups? What are they eating? What causes their populations to crash, and when they do, who suffers? And how, based on all these data, can we best protect them --- and thus, the ecosystem?

Quite a number of long genetic terminology examples merely brushed my comprehension, I not working with those terms on a daily basis. But I enjoyed the discussion, the chance to stretch my sphere of thinking, and a demonstration of the various machines (such as a genetic sequencer) at work.

Bountiful Harvest of the Rose Family