Lavender Festival!

Every year people attend the Tulip Festival.  This year, olivetheotherreindeer suggested we try something different, such as going to the Lavender Festival at Sequim, which lasts only one weekend!

To get to Sequim, we had to take the ferry across the Puget Sound.

When I was about to take pictures of the guys, the announcement came for people to return to their vehicles.  Bummer!

The first farm we went to was called Purple Haze…

Erick and Jeffrey started by trying out some local delicacy, like the Lavender Virgin Margarita…

Jeffrey immediately gave it the thumbs down.  There was also the lavender white chocolate ice cream, which according to Carol, just tasted like regular white chocolate ice cream.

That’s when we started taking pictures…

And more pictures…

We paid $10 for unlimited access to 7 different farms, with free shuttling service provided from farm to farm.  The central hub is at downtown Sequim, so we took the bus to get there.  It was a squeeze…

I was sandwiched so badly I had a hard time even getting my camera out, but as you can see from the picture, some of us were just comfortably sitting on the seats while the rest of us suffered.

We arrived at the hub where it resembles a fair with booths and long lines all over the place.  Many of us opted for the Gyro for lunch…

After lunch, Erick found this incredibly large farm with called Lost Mountain, which was hyped with “100 different species of Lavender!!!”  So to Lost Mountain we went.  We took the bus again, and this time we squeezed two rows between the aisles!  After the bus made its first stop, we were able to sit down, but not before our hands turned tomato red…

Picture doesn’t do justice to the colors of our hands.  Anyway, we arrived at Lost Mountain…

So we did find a hundred species of Lavender, but apparently there was only one of each, contained in a small patch of land!  We were conned.  Nevertheless, we made the most out of the place.  One interesting feature was a water mill running purple water…

It’s hard to see the purple water, but I assure you it was purple.  Karen also decided to bring out her favorite cartoon character to join the fun…

Also some of us decided to collect their own lavender…

I have no idea what olivethereindeer was cutting there…

By the time we were ready to go, we had to wait in line for the bus again.  Some people’s sunburns were starting to become apparent as a strange mark surfaced on my back…

It wasn’t really a burn, but I still have this mark today.  Maybe it’s from the camera strap?

Turned out we weren’t able to get onto the next two buses because they were both full, so we ended up waiting for an hour!  Next time, we should just drive instead of taking the shuttle…  While most of us were just standing around, some of us managed to make the time productive.

Finally we were able to squeeze on the bus and return to our parking lot.  That’s when we decided to check out at the beach with the lighthouse.  On the way, Erick took a wrong turn somewhere and we ended up getting a nice view of…

A deer.  He stared at us as we made a U turn in someone’s back yard.

When we arrived at the beach, there was a lighthouse in view, but it was really small.  Even with my super duper 300x zoom lense, I was still only able to offer you this picture with minimal details…

Unfortunately to reach the lighthouse required a 5.5 mile hike, each way!  That’s like circling Green Lake four times!  We decided to pass and just enjoy the beach…

Erick was really into playing chicken fight on a log…

After that, a shark appeared in the water…

Okay, so there was no shark, but we did take a funny picture!  😛

Then it was time to go home.  We first dropped by Taco Time for some to-go dinner, and then we got held up waiting for the draw bridge.  The traffic literally stopped for 10 minutes. While waiting, Jeffrey had an emergency crisis and needed a place to…  download some software.

Unfortunately he couldn’t find an outlet.  Later Johnny, Angela, Jeffrey and Grace stopped at an alternate location while the rest of us headed over to the Ferry.  We thought they didn’t make it to the 9:20 ferry because they were the fifth car in line for the next ferry, but they managed to squeeze in.  Close call!

Anyway, then we took the ferry ride home…

That’s it, folks, our Lavender Festival trip!  It was fun, but we most likely won’t be going another Lavender trip for a long time.