Raven's Roads
Living an interesting life: the travels and musings
of motorcycling author Linda R. Moore

Sep 11, 2004

9th September, first part

Filed in Landmark-Hunting, Travel, Washington 2004

9th September

Had a good night’s sleep, with kittage wandering in and out at various times. Got up, did email etc. and we eventually headed up to Olympia farmer’s market.

We had lunch first; they have a row of little food places and I got a curry which was tasty. Then I wandered around with LV and got the apples I wanted for the pie I would be making later, and we took in a couple of the nearby snarfs. There’s a marina which I saw yesterday from the capitol, and a few markers here and there, some of them quite colourful. Penguin did his thing, and my snarf balance went up. Again. If snarfs were dollars…

It drizzled in bits and bobs but only outright rained for a very short period of time. After we had taken in the extra Olympia snarfs, including a really cool fountain that spat little showers up into the air and which one could watch for ages, we headed in a somewhat southerly direction.

Now, I’m not too sure where we went. I just had it all told to me, but I really didn’t retain the info because it’s late and I’m tired.I know that we headed south in a loop, and that the roads we took were pretty and for the most part lined with trees.

Among the places I remember are these: Tenino, Tumwater, Rochester. There was an obscure marker at the far end of a parking lot owned by a local gun club; there was an old railroad depot that we left bookmarks in the door of (it was a museum). We found two Oregon trail markers, one planned and one spotted from the road as we passed; there was a kiosk in honour of the Bush family (but a totally different bunch from the current ones in power) â€“ each of the four sides had a panel with information â€“ and a roadside marker to the site of an old fort, a very lonely location.

Laugh of the trip: a sign at a dog kennel saying â€œIf you train with us, sit happens: :-)

Favourite snarf: definitely Mima Mounds. Technically speaking they are not historical but natural historical; however, there is info there about their history and the research done, but basically it is a prairie covered in weird bumps like burial mounds, only they’re not. They’re natural. There are various theories and some of them are sillier than others, but the place is really cool and I would have liked to spend more time there, but it wasn’t possible. I will return.

The place just made me feel happy because it was pretty and in the middle of a forest…and my first prairie, so far as I can tell. Natural places lift my spirits.