Ski to Sea Memories

Posted By Mimi / Activities, Events, Festival, Outdoors, Team / Events, Festivals / 1 Comment

It’s Ski to Sea time again!  Every Sunday before Memorial Day, marks the day teams gather at Mt. Baker at dawn to start the first leg of Bellingham’s original adventure race.  Ski to Sea Weekend is one of Bellingham’s BIG annual events.  So beloved are the race, the parades and the festivals it has the power to beckon “Bellinghamsters” back home from places far and wide to participate and visit with their friends and old neighbors.

Fairhaven, where the race ends and the Festival is held, morphs overnight from a small, quaint, historical village into a sea of people and music, vendors and race participants.  Over the years I have noticed there are more and more unfamiliar faces in the Ski to Sea crowd, punctuated by only the occasional bump with a familiar face.  This serves as a reminder of the changes and growth Bellingham has seen over the past 35 years since my family moved here in the 1980’s.  We have most certainly morphed from what was a small “Mill Town by a bay” when I moved here, to a bustling, vibrant, interesting, semi-cosmopolitan small city.

This weekend I will spend time with friends (like we do every year) and I am sure we will share (again) our own 35+ years of Ski to Sea memories.  I hear the same stories every year, and laugh each time like it is the first time I have ever heard them.  (I notice as we all get older, the stories of our youth take on a whole new level of hilarity.)

There was the year there was a sailing leg to end the race across the Bay, and ZERO wind…none!  The race ended with catamarans and small sailboats stranded and strewn all over the bay for hours into the night (I think it was the very next year they changed that leg to kayaking!).  Or the time friends participated in the canoe leg, which was also the year the tide was soooo far out, they had to carry their canoe through over a mile of mud flats to reach their teammate who only upon their arrival could sail their way to the finish line.  The road rash stories from downhill running or cycling – and show off the scars for proof.  The years with not enough snow to either downhill or cross country.  Nostalgic stories of the year it was soooo cold the only vendor doing much business at the festival was the guy selling those super heavy Hippie llama wool sweaters made in Peru.  (He killed it that year!)  Springtime and early summer in the Pacific Northwest can be pretty unpredictable!

What is predictable is that Ski to Sea Weekend is the distinct marker that the long, warm summer days are just around the corner!  It brings excitement to everyone around here knowing that the time for all of our favorite summer things to do has arrived!  Days of boating, crabbing, fishing, kayaking, agate hunting, clamming!  If the vegetable garden is not planted by Ski to Sea, it means you are late and need to get moving!  It is the time for planting flower beds and tackling the outdoor projects that have waited all winter for the dry days and the internal energy to complete them.  It means daylight until 10:00 pm, BBQ’s with friends, fire pits, camping and hiking…there is just so much to do in the Pacific Northwest in the summertime it is hard to fit it all in!

Ski to Sea Weekend is also the marker for the start of our busiest time of  the year for real estate.  Historically we begin to see a surge in listings just after the Ski to Sea weekend, and more buyers out looking.   If you want to keep tabs on what is going on with the Bellingham and Whatcom County Real Estate market this summer, set up a search on the NWLivingRE.com site.  There you will find accurate, real time updates on what is for sale, and what properties are selling for which is good information for both buyers and sellers (and those who are simply curious).

And, if you see my face in the crowd this weekend, please make sure to say, “HI!”.

-Mimi

“If anyone you care about needs a Realtor, please share my name with them.”

And if your need one, click HERE for a copy of the Official Ski to Sea RACE MAP!

 

 

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