Skagit County Habitat for Humanity Build

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During the Escapade in Tucson last winter, we had attended a seminar about the Habitat for Humanity Care-A-Vanner program. It is setup to bring in a group of RVers and have them work on a build together. Sure, we could look for HFH builds in areas near our travels and volunteer with them, but this sounded more interesting since we would be camping with other volunteers and working with them on the project. Getting the chance to both give back and do some home construction seemed like a fun thing. Since we don't own a sticks and bricks house anymore, I don't have as many remodeling or construction projects to work on. In our 30+ years of home ownership, I could probably count on one hand, the number of times we hired out a project. I will admit that I kind of miss that aspect of this nomadic lifestyle - just not enough to give it up! 

As we put together our summer travel plans last winter, we found one of the locations with a Care-A-Vanner program was in Mount Vernon Washington - an hour north of Seattle. Since that was the general direction we were heading, we picked this build. Figuring out the timing was a little more complicated. The program is setup in two week time slots. Usually there are numerous two week slots available back to back throughout the scheduled build. Some locations actually have their own "campground" where the volunteers stay.  Other locations use local campgrounds for the participants. We picked the one that encompassed July 4th since finding a campsite during a holiday weekend can often be problematic. So by early April we had one aspect of the summer travels pinned down. 

At the end of May, we got an email from the coordinator in Mount Vernon to verify we were still planning on attending and giving us a few nearby campgrounds to consider for our stay. This was a big surprise to us. We knew we would be paying for our camp site since Mount Vernon doesn't have their own place. But from the seminar we had attended, we were under the impression there would be spots reserved for the volunteers at a campground. So our plan to be there over July 4th turned out to be a bit of a problem since we didn't have a spot reserved and the holiday was just a month away. Of the three possible options, one campground was quite expensive and another one doesn't have sites large enough for our rig. Fortunately the county run marina and campground had room for us in the nearby town of La Conner. 

The drive from Yakima to La Conner is just over 200 miles. The first part of the drive takes us over the Cascades at Snoqualmie Pass. It isn't too steep but there was construction so that made for a bit of a slowdown. One of the construction projects is pretty interesting. They are building a 66 foot wide animal overpass. Apparently there are many underpasses already in place under I-90 but elk don't like to use them so this solution will allow them to safely cross the expressway. It's not perfectly clear how you teach them to use the overpass. The second part of the drive takes us through the greater Seattle area as we head north. Since we were driving on the Sunday before the holiday, the traffic wasn't too bad. 

Back in early June, we had contacted the one other couple that was part of our workgroup and they arranged to stay at the same campground. When we first pulled in, Chris drove past our assigned spot and realized there was no way we would fit in it. The camp host was nice and understood the people in the office taking reservations are not great at determining rig placement. It isn't a big place - maybe 50 or 60 spots - and the spots are tight but she found one that we squeezed into while admittedly having our backend sticking into the spot behind us. She said it would be fine and they just wouldn't put someone there. Good thing the place wasn't completely booked for the holiday. 

The two couples that had worked the prior two weeks were still here and the local HFH coordinator stopped by and we had dinner together with one of my favorites - salmon. We got a bit of a scoop as to what to expect at the job site. Two houses were underway. One was up and enclosed with roof and windows. The other was mostly framed with some of the roof trusses to be put up. The work schedule is Tuesday through Saturday 9 AM to 4 PM. The reason for the work week shift is to allow many of the local volunteers that still work full time the chance to come in on Saturday. This is often when the future homeowners will be able to show up as well.

Being 4th of July weekend, we actually have two days to explore the area before starting work. With the 4th being a Tuesday, our first scheduled workday was a holiday so we had that day off. Fortuitous planning on our part. Our first day trip took us across the Swinomish Channel onto Fildalgo Island - one of numerous islands in this part of the state. This one is accessible by car since the channel is fairly narrow. Many others are only accessible by boat or ferry. In the northwest corner of the island is the town of Anacortes and on the western edge of town is the beautiful 220 acre Washington Park. This city park offers a campground and boat launch plus a nicely paved 2.2 mile loop around its perimeter. The loop is open to vehicles during certain times but is narrow and with no real parking spots along the way.  Scores of people were out enjoying a walk so it took what seemed like forever to drive the loop only to come out and park in one of the lots on the way in.

Overlooking Boat Launch at Washington Park

We hiked the perimeter using some of the many dirt trails and only using the paved trail when required. Three quarters of the trail is along the water. I'm not sure if this is technically Puget Sound we are overlooking or if the different areas have different names but we aren't quite looking at the open waters of the Pacific Ocean. We found most of the geocaches around the island only running into a snag at one of them. Practically on top of the hiding spot was where someone had set up their hammock. We skipped this one figuring we didn't need to disturb them for another cache.

Overlooking Some of the Many Islands in the Area

View Along the Trail

After having our picnic near the play area, we headed to Deception Pass State Park. This is on the southern tip of Fidalgo Island and the northern tip of Whidbey Island. The area was crawling with cars and people. After driving across the bridge, we stopped in the state park parking lot and lucked into an open spot. With our $30 Discover Pass hanging on the mirror, we were good to go. We headed out onto the bridge which does have a pedestrian walkway on both side. There is just barely enough room for two people to pass one another and on the other side of the safety cable is the bumper to bumper traffic jam.

Bridge Over Deception Pass

The bridge is about 180 feet above the water which gives a great view of the surrounding area. There were a lot of boats out as well. One of them that was heading inland was really struggling. You could hear its engine roaring but it wasn't making good progress. What we learned while doing an earthcache here is that when the tidal forces at their peak, the water current is close to 10 MPH and an astounding 2 million gallons of water per second flows through the pass! Apparently kayakers come out sometimes and ride the standing waves created but we didn't see any while we were here. 

Water is Flowing Towards Us, Boats Are Struggling

Swirling Waters

View from Bridge

After seeing the views from the bridge, we did a short walk to the top of Goose Rock. There were a dozen or so people up here but the steep trail keeps many of the folks away. The views were nice but there were too many power lines running across the area detracting from the views. 

On July 4, the little town of La Conner (pop ~900) had several events scheduled throughout the day. All of them were within easy walking distance of the campgrounds. Festivities started out with a parade. Supposedly anybody could be part of it, but we opted to leave the motorhome parked even though I suspect ours would have been the first RV in the parade. It turned out to be one of the smaller parades we can remember - much smaller than the Rush fireman's parade back in our old hometown. The old fire truck was in great shape as were many of the old tractors. The Cat Car was just plain odd but very well crafted.

La Conner's Old Fire Truck

Cat Car Leading the Tractors

Ready to Pounce

I Miss My John Deere

A Fish Bike

After the parade, we wandered around the quaint downtown area of La Conner. Many of the businesses are along the Swinomish Channel with boardwalk access along much of it. It is a big boating are with a mix of pleasure and working boats.

A Fiddler Crab

No Room on the Fishing Boat

In the early evening, there were a couple musical groups that were set up in the green space next to the marina. Several food vendors had their tents next to the venue. It was a beautiful evening and many people showed up. Some even took advantage of the atmosphere to get in some dancing. Styles and competency ran the gamut. One guy showed up in an old Toyota pickup truck that was decked out with all sorts of toys and decorations. There was even a automatic bubble blower that was a great hit with the children.

The Toy-Mobile Arrives

Children Fascinated with the Toys

Nice Evening for a Concert

Dancing to the Music

The fireworks show was at dusk. It was hard to tell where the real display was to be since there was a continuous display of pretty impressive fireworks from many of the locals too. We eventually found a decent spot to set up our chairs and we enjoyed the show. I even took the camera and tripod to see what I could capture of the sights. 

Palm Tree?

With all the fun over, it was now time to head off to the Habitat for Humanity project. The drive from the campground is only 20 minutes or so and work starts at 9 AM but it still required us to set the alarm clock - something we seldom do anymore. After arriving at the site, we are introduced to Pablo who is the general contractor. He will be the guy that feels out our capabilities and likes when it comes to the construction project and utilizes us in the best manner. 

For the each of the 9 days we are here, the work crew varies in size from about a dozen during the week to close to 30 on Saturdays. Besides the four Care-a-Vanners, there are 4 engineering students from Singapore here on a one year study program which included a 7 week internship working with HFH. Several of the regular volunteers would show up on the same day or two each week. Much of Chris' work was exterior painting on the more complete home. By the time our last day rolled around, she became the de facto painting supervisor for many of the church group that had come to help on Saturday.

Working on Gable End

Sheathing Roof

Chris Painting

I spent most of the time working on the other house. Most days we were given different jobs to mix things up for us. My tasks ranged from helping to set roof trusses, installing fascia boards and roof sheathing. On the last day, I did get to work on the other house by installing the back porch decking. For the most part, there was a great scaffolding system up which allowed for easier and safer work up high. That didn't mean that I wasn't required to crawl around the roof trusses to complete the various tasks. Even after the first day, we realized our old bodies are not used to this type of physical activity. Some of the local volunteers commented they only show up one day a week because of that fact. I'm just glad we didn't sign up for back to back 2 week blocks.

After a couple days of work, it became painfully obvious how challenging Pablo's job must be. He is never positive who will show up each day and when he gets new people such as Care-a-Vanners, he needs to scope out what he can trust them with before cutting them loose with larger, more complicated tasks. Admittedly, I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist. I'm more used to doing fine woodworking rather than construction grade. I don't know many of the tricks to make this style of work go faster. Plus it seemed like we were continually running into issues created by others. In most cases, we dealt with it by doing the next step as best we could. Only a couple times did we need to undo prior work before we could continue with our task. 

Repairing Porch Post

One day Pablo asked me to work on the framing needed for the valley of the front porch. I looked at the situation and realized that I would likely spend the better part of the day trying to figure out all the angles required to get a 5/12 roof to come into a 4/12 roof. We actually were saved that day when it turned out we had no power at the job site. We did have some battery powered tools and a generator that allowed us to put up much of the roof sheathing. 

I suppose each HFH location is different, but this one had several enclosed trailers on site containing a good variety of tools as well as all the building materials and fasteners. By 3:30 each day, we would stop work and start to clean up the site. It always amazed me just how many ladders and tools would be scattered about. It didn't help that by that time my body was dead tired and really didn't want to carry that extension ladder back to the trailer.

All in all, it was a fun but tiring two weeks. I'm not opposed to trying another Care-a-Vanner program in the future, but it will likely be many months out before my body will agree to it.

With Half the other Care-a-Vanner Team

On our second weekend, we did a couple other day trips. One south of La Conner and one north. Everett Washington is home to one of the Boeing facilities. I suppose it goes without saying that a plant that make jumbo jets is going to be big! The plant offers tours but for it isn't free. At $25 per person, it seemed a bit steep, but we really wanted to see the place. Unfortunately our visit was on a Sunday, so the work crew was greatly reduced, but it still was a fascinating place to see. Each tour group is put on two Greyhound style buses and taken to a couple different locations. No photography is permitted during the tour so you will need to believe me when I say it is big and neat. 

The main building is the largest (by volume - ~472 million cubic feet) in the world. It covers 98 acres and is where Boeing builds the 747, 767, 777, and 787. The production volume is roughly 2 planes per week. Approximately 30,000 people work in the plant. There are miles of tunnels underneath the facility for utilities and worker access. The tour takes you up to a level overlooking all the work below. It gives you a decent view of how all the parts come together. 

The tour starts and ends at the Future of Flight Aviation Center. There is a large room with displays of many different aspects of the history of Boeing and flight in general. A couple of actual size jet engines with covers removed to see the complexity of these things. The landing gear and tires are massive. Did you know that the greatest stress on the tires is at takeoff not landing? They even have a mockup of a module they built for the International Space Station. There was even a section of the center that was geared towards children. Admittedly there were some of the demo displays that the kid in me had to play with even if just for a couple minutes. Of course there is a gift shop that was doing a brisk business. 

Overlooking the Future of Flight Center

Inside of Jet Engine

Some of the Many Flags from Nations that Bought Planes

Lots to See and Do

An outdoor viewing platform gives a good view of the adjacent Paine Airfield. This is where the newly built jets get their maiden voyage. Not sure I would want to be on the first flight. There were two Dream Lifters parked while we were here. These specially build planes are used to transport some of the bigger parts from other plants around the world. Since the fleet consists of only four, having two here was unusual.

Expensive Cargo Plane

On our other day off, we headed north to Bellingham. We had actually been through here before albeit 22 years ago. The Alaska Marine Highway starts/ends here at its southern port. We had done a 5 week trip to Alaska, renting an RV for the first half and taking the ferry from Skagway to Bellingham with multiple stops along the way. We really didn't see the place since we got off the ferry and took a shuttle bus down to SeaTac airport. 

This time we planned to check out a few parks and maybe do some geocaching. The other draw for me is a place called Grizzly Industrial. Unless you're a woodworker, you may have never heard of this place. I used to make periodic trips to another one of their stores in the Williamsport Pennsylvania area which is about 2.5 hour drive. That store was big and bright and had many of the items on display that were in the inch thick catalog I used to receive. Since Bellingham is the home location for the business, I was expecting its store to be even more impressive. As it turns out, this was a bit of a let down. The store was much smaller. Maybe one fifth the size of the one in Pennsylvania. I guess it's just as well since I really don't have room or the need for much of what they sell. 

We did find a nearby park with a handful of geocaches. Whatcom Falls sounds like some newfangled name but is actually the name of the nearby lake and the creek that flows over a couple falls inside the park. With over 3 miles of nicely maintained trails, it was a fun place to hike. This was also the place to walk your dog. We saw many, mostly off leash well behaved pooches either following their owners out for a walk or in one case a dog keeping up with his owner on a mountain bike out for a ride. 

Chris Surveys the Falls

No Worries of Train on this Track

The next stop was to Sehome Hill. A 180 acre park adjacent to Western Washington University. As the name implies, it is a hill which made for some effort when we headed down into the university to do a webcam cache. There is a very sturdy tower in the park. One substantial enough for even Chris to climb without fear. The downside was that the surrounding trees have grown enough that there really isn't much of a view. 

Sturdy Tower

Art???

Campus Has Nice Views

We figured since we were here, we should check out some of the marina and port area of Bellingham. It is an impressive place. Some of the fishing boats were much bigger than I was expecting. 

Marina in Port of Bellingham

Sailor Statue

Big Fishing Boats

We finished up our work with Habitat successfully. What's that mean? Well none of us Care-a-Vanners were injured although we were all worn out. We helped make some progress on the two homes under construction. And we met some great people along the way. I may have even learned a trick or two for a future HFH we might tackle.

Still Smiling on our Last Day

Some of the Crew on Our Last Day