there *is* local ice cream, that must employ some folks

[ironymaiden]

as was foretold, we are spending our anniversary on Lopez Island. a year ago today we had our last meal out. this morning i watched a helicopter deliver vaccine doses to a clinic being held at the island community center.

we're in a charming wee octagonal cottage with 10 skylights, around 20 houseplants, and a woodstove. (it also has excellent wifi, a roku tv with most of the streaming services, and full cel phone service which just feels bizarre.) it's less than five minutes' walk to the beach, groceries, coffee shop, and bookstore. Leela is very happy with the level of local wildlife activity. we haven't yet figured out how an ordinary person could make a living here without tourists, but the demographics suggest that there are a lot of retirees.

it's quite flat for Washington, so there are lots of drainage ditches and bits of wetland. there are walking paths rather than sidewalks, but since it's the unenriched grey soil of the area, it might as well be concrete. the "village" we're in is odd...like a loose cluster of businesses rather than a town. the loose cluster of businesses includes a tiny UW Medicine clinic with a helipad. actual homes seem to be strung out farther away. we walked past this place on the morning dog walk; there's a lot of solar panels on buildings here but this was the first we saw with solar hot water.

we're here for the rest of the week; there will be more exploring and some hiking to come, but for now it's all quiet domesticity with different walls and different walks. being married remains awesome and i'm glad to be having a saf(er) adventure to celebrate.

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

Sounds like a great getaway!

[buhrger]

we haven't yet figured out how an ordinary person could make a living here without tourists
if one was permanently working from home, it might be possible....?

[ironymaiden]

now, yes. ten years ago?

I do wonder if Island County is about to have a population boom.

[ivy]

I imagine particularly once Starlink is more widely embraced, we're going to see a lot of people leaving the cities for rural splendor.

[lovelyangel]

My ex-sister-in-law / brother-in-law have lived on Lopez Island for decades. He's in construction – house building. So, yeah, it's possible to live there and make a living. Also, he built his own home on the island. I haven't been there since the 1980s, but it's a pretty place. I'd love to take my bicycle there.

[ironymaiden]

Aha! It would be very expensive to bring labor in, so construction makes lots of sense.
It's very bikeable here, seems to be popular transportation for the locals. It looks like there's an active bike rental business when there's not a pandemic.

[strangelyjonathan]

A change of scenery sounds nice. I hope you have a very happy anniversary. :)

[annofowlshire]

Happy Change of Scenery-versary! XD

We went to Orcas Island several years ago. The woman there had two AirBnBs, a small chicken farm (about 60 chickens), apples, and other stuff going on. I think the farming mostly served locals since we were there in the off season and she didn’t have any extra for us to buy from herl.

The area we’re living in now isn’t toooo much different. Lots of retirees, lots of BnBs, lots of tourist attractions. Most of the people who don’t work in tourism are here supporting local community-tradespeople, teachers, shop owners of various stripes (which also crosses over to tourism I guess), etc. Local economy is forestry and mining (although a lot less of the latter than there used to be).

And then there are those of us who work from home or commute part time to The Cities. When we moved here, we expected Mr to be away in Nottingham 4 days a week. Post Coronavirus we think 2 days a week is most likely. My job was always assumed to be work from home full time, thankfully. Dunno how we’d coordinate Mr being in Notts part of the week and me being in London part of the week with Smol Human.

There’s already been a “countryside boom” in the UK during Coronavirus as people realize their jobs may continue to be remote post-pandemic. We’d planned this move before Coronavirus, but we suddenly saw houses that had been stagnant on the market for years flying and prices going up as everyone else got the same idea.

[sistawendy]

Lopez Island

I am jelly! Dayumn!

[jesse_the_k]

That looks simply heavenly! May the three of you luxuriate like whoa.