Vashon Island

If you’re biking over from Seattle, beware the hill! Coming off the Fauntleroy Ferry from West Seattle is not like landing in Winslow on Bainbridge Island. On Vashon you immediately face a pretty drastic incline that feels like it goes on for a mile as you climb, and climb and climb. It’s a doozie! But it makes for one hell of a ride coming back down the hill to the ferry station.

Thanks to Stacy for taking me here yesterday. It’s a great Island … and so close to Seattle.

No, it’s not the same place that I grew up in. It used to be full of hardworking middle-class workers. Down the middle-of-road common sense politics and people. Those days are long gone…as those people have been taxed out of their homes. They even got old man Stewart! I never thought Id ever see that day!

I was there when Rich Wheeler won his first state wrestling championship and set in motion the Vashon Island wrestling dynasty. Wheeler? Who’s that? Yup, his family packed up and left shortly after I did. I was there the day Bill Burby died. A fantastic cross country coach, a great teacher full of life, and most importantly a fantastic dad to two of my high school friends. Do they even call the Strawberry Festival run the Bill Burby run anymore? I was there when the Dairy Queen was just a drive up. It’s not even called the DQ anymore.

I got out just in time as all the Microsoft money funneled into the area back in the early 90s. I still miss home and my folks still live there. But it’s just not the place that I remember. Things change for sure. But their was nothing like Vashon Island back before the early 90s.

My family moved to Vashon when I was in the second grade. It takes forebearance to actually live there. Everyone is in everyone else’s business. There were about 100 people in my high school graduating class. I recommend the Strawberry Festival in July, community events at the Blue Heron, KVI beach in any weather, walking or biking around and any weekend there’s an studio, garden, art or pottery tour. (Visitors comment on the hippies and hippy-wannabes, but also be prepared for an oddly high ratio of lawyers!)

Unusual vibe on this island. We visited on a Sunday and it was quiet and detached and weird, its own little universe.

That is for sure. But I wouldn’t live here unless I wanted to fight ferries every day.