SKYKOMISH MUSIC FESTIVAL

Friday night we headed up to Skykomish for the big 'Skykomish Music Festival'.  We've been hearing about this festival for weeks and it's a huge deal if you live in Skykomish.  Given that  there are about 200 people that live in and around Skykomish, 'huge' is a relative term.

The festival is a fund raiser for the Skykomish school district's parent teacher student organization.  The entire district comprises of 38 kids.  Last year's graduating class was 3.  Or 1, depending on how you count.  There was one kid from Skykomish plus 2 exchange students from Brazil.

So Friday night we headed out on highway 2 and set up camp on Mike and Marisa's property and had a nice discussion around the fire pit with Mike and Marisa, Mike's parents, Bill and Reggie, and some neighbors, Don and Maggie.

Skykomish was a railroad town.  It was the exchange point where diesel locomotives were swapped out for electric locomotives to go through the 7 mile tunnel through the cascades.  The town was also used for refueling locomotives and it was the refueling, along with some other practices that lead to contamination of the ground with fuel and other heavy metals.  There has been quite the cleanup in Skykomish and the railroad agreed to a 50 million dollar mitigation project, moving houses, digging down some 15 feet or so, removing contaminated soil and replacing it with clean soil.

Don was a retired forest service surveyor, so we heard stories of Skykomish from years past.

Saturday morning dawned a bit damp, but we moved a tent up to the festival site and then Jodi and set out to hike 'Beckler's Peak', a 5000 foot mountain on the outskirts of Skykomish.

The hike was good.  7.5 miles round trip with 2200 feet of elevation gain.  Jodi had no problem with hiking it, I huffed and puffed a bit, but made it to the top with a grand view of the surrounding mountains and valleys.

We only saw perhaps a dozen people on the trail, but as luck would have it I bumped into a work associate near the summit.  We had run a half marathon with him back in 2009.  They too were intrigued by the great Skykomish Music Festival and promised to stop by.

After the hike we headed over to the festival site, the Skykomish town park and ball field.  It's a great park right on the river.  A river front ball park with campsites, flush toilets, and a nice covered kitchen area.

By the time we got there, the music was underway.

Mike and brother Greg take time out from the music to fish the Skykomish river that runs right next to the festival site

The folks in Skykomish have a sense of humor.  Keep in mind this festival is held in the town park, is for the town kids, and the entire town turns out for it.  I went to buy a dinner but I didn't have any cash.  Just a check.  I asked 'do you take checks'? The fellow looked up at me, eyebrows knitted, and said "Is it an out of town check?".  I said 'yes', and then he nodded in satisfaction "Good. We don't take checks from town".

Marisa hoists Russell up to make a special announcement during the festival.   Russell seems well known in Skykomish

The festival is organized by a small group and Marisa seems to be the driving force.  Mike and Marisa also have a boat on D dock and are parents of Russell, one half of the 'Monkey Show' from an earlier post.

The story of how Mike and Marisa came to Skykomish is a good one. According to his parents, Mike had wanted to hike a portion of the Pacific Coast Trail (PCT) that extends from Mexico to Canada.  Raised in Maryland, he came out west to hike the Washington portion of the trail.  Again, according to his parents, he spent about 6 months preparing and reading about the trail then headed out west and after hiking the trail found work in Skykomish which is not too far from the trail.

Fast forward 2 years.  Marisa, also from Maryland, decides to hike the trail with a girlfriend.  The friend suffers an injury preventing her from completing the trail, but Marisa forges ahead alone, determined to hike from Oregon to Canada.

At Stevens pass she decides to take a day off and get mail at one of PCT's mail drops located in Skykomish.  After being on the trail she stops in a local establishment (the whistling pig, one of the oldest continuously running bars in Washington state), orders a beer and a begins a conversation with some locals.

As Marisa tells the story, the people in the bar keep saying 'oh, you gotta meet Mike', but at that point in time she had no interest in meeting anyone, she just wanted food, a beer, a good nights rest to tackle the trail in the morning.

Apparently one thing led to another and she agreed to go to a local party and who should be there but Mike  They chat.  The next morning he gives her a ride back to Stevens but on the way up to the pass it's clear something is happening.  I didn't get the whole story, but Mike makes a snap decision to hike the remaining portion of the trail to Canada with Marisa (Mike's parents chuckle at the 6 months preparation the first time around and the 5 minute preparation the second time around).

The rest is history.

In any case, the festival is well organized, the music was great and we all had a good time.

On Sunday morning Jodi and I gathered up our stuff and headed back to Seattle where we had roughly an hour to clean up before Ken and his daughter Kelli and Kelli's friend Anaka showed up for a 5 day cruise.