Short Trips
ROSLYN -- This place has risen from the economic ashes so many times that you might be tempted to call it Phoenix.
Don't.
Especially as a visitor to a local saloon late on a Saturday night.
But, like the phoenix bird of Greek mythology, Roslyn has risen from its ashes repeatedly since its incorporation 120 years ago.
By Gordy Holt | May 11, 2006
Short Trips
Northwest weather sometimes can ruin even the best-laid plans. The almost daily deluges lately can wash away travel plans faster than you can shout "Please stop raining!" A couple of weeks ago my plans were swept downstream -- literally.
The day started gloriously for this time of year -- partly sunny, broken, white puffy clouds, with the temperature hovering in the mid 40s. Rain, however, was in the forecast. How far out wasn't clear.
By Jeff Larsen | February 9, 2006
My husband has become an obsessive golfer, but the kids and I still love to ski and snowboard. With these irreconcilable differences, how can we have a successful winter family vacation?
Fortunately, we can head to the Comox Valley, about three hours north of Victoria on Vancouver Island. There, thanks to two starkly different climate zones in one geographic location, he can hit the green fairways of some top-notch golf courses and we can frolic in the snow -- all on the same winter's day.
By Anne Mullens | January 19, 2006
Golfers are the Indiana Jones of the sports world. But instead of the bullwhip and brown fedora, they're decked out with ball caps and graphite-shafted clubs, roaming the globe in search of rare gems -- those terrific, sought-after courses tucked away in exotic locales.
That's why Vancouver Island is a dream destination, with more than 40 courses sprinkled across one of the great expanses of mountain and oceanside wilderness in North America. And much of the island is swaddled in a weather zone that features moderate temperatures and golf throughout the year.
By Ian Cruickshank | July 14, 2005
Short Trips
When you're the world's worst gambler, a casino wouldn't seem like a high-priority destination. But after I wrote last summer about the Quinault Beach Resort and Casino near Ocean Shores, I just had to try gambling one more time -- this time a little closer to home in Bow, a small berg just north of Burlington, about 70 miles north of Seattle. After all, I had another $30 to burn (i.e. lose).
By Jeff Larsen | October 21, 2004
Dreaming of a family beach vacation?
Think Chelan.
The Central Washington resort town doesn't have the tropical allure of Hawaii's beaches or the verve of Southern California's beach towns, but it has lots to make families happy.
The town of about 4,000, at the east end of Lake Chelan, is dotted with comfortable, waterfront condos and hotels, sandy beaches and tree-shaded parks.
By Kristin Jackson | July 16, 2004
LEAVENWORTH -- For the better part of the past 70 years, Kjell Bakke has been launching himself or helping scores of other daredevils soar into the star-lit winter night skies from a well-preserved ski hill on the northern edge of this Bavarian-motif village, glistening a mile below in the distance.
By Angelo Bruscas | February 26, 2004
Short Trips
CASHMERE Here's a good example of the most balanced diet of the new century: During my first day in Cashmere, for breakfast I had a cup of coffee, followed by a tasty confection called an Aplet topped off with two Cotlets (the Aplet's apricot counterpart). For lunch I ate two Golden Delicious apples along with a Bartlett pear, then chased both fruit varieties down with a strawberry soda at Doan's Valley Pharmacy's soda fountain.
Problem was, it felt almost normal in Cashmere to eat like that.
By Jeff Larsen | October 9, 2003
Short Trips
SOOKE, B.C. Fall is definitely in the air on the southwest shore of Vancouver Island.
As the early evening sun angled sharply through the towering trees near the entrance to the Country Cupboard Cafe just west of Sooke, owner Jennie Vivian stopped our conversation about her cute chaletlike building and gestured toward the window behind me. The sunlight, she said, looked different somehow. To her the change in the light was the first sign of fall, regardless if the calendar indicated it was only late August.
By Jeff Larsen | September 11, 2003
ROSLYN -- A script might read something like this:
(Camera pans downtown) Yes, this is a story about a chipper little coal-mining town in Washington, rich in ethnic heritage but dogged by history. It has survived good times and bad, and in the coming year or two will be thrust into the 21st century more dramatically than any other town in the state (fadeaway shot of the cemetery).
By Jeff Larsen | July 4, 2002
