Insiders Guide to Hiking in Snohomish County with Richard Porter and Nick Shekeryk from Snohomish County Placemakers

Richard Porter and Nick Shekeryk, hosts of the Snohomish County Placemakers Podcast, join Jennie and Craig to talk about their favorite urban and backcountry trails in Snohomish County as well as some of their favorite places to eat, drink and stay after a hike.

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Transcript

Jennie Flaming: 0:00

Jennie, welcome to the Washington State hiking podcast. I'm your host. Jennie Thwing Flaming,

Craig Romano: 0:10

and I'm your co host. Craig Romano

Jennie Flaming: 0:12

Craig and I are happy to have you here. We provide practical and timely, seasonal hiking advice for hikers, trail runners and potential hikers and trail runners of all skill and ability levels that is helpful, accurate, fun and inclusive. All right, everybody, well, Craig and I are super excited to bring you this wonderful episode with a couple of great guests today. So we have Richard Porter and Nick Shekeryk from Snohomish County tourism, and Snohomish County Tourism is sponsoring the Washington State podcast, hiking podcast for the month of April. So thank you so much, and thanks for being here, guys. Another fun fact about Nick and Richard is that they also have a podcast that is about Snohomish County, called Snohomish County place makers and so welcome to both of you.

Richard: 1:11

Thank you. Thanks for having us. Yeah, yeah,

Nick: 1:13

excited to be here. Yeah, we're

Jennie Flaming: 1:15

excited to have you too. So can you each just introduce yourselves? Tell us a little bit about how you came to your work and what your relationship is like with hiking.

Richard: 1:26

Yeah. My name is Richard Porter. I'm a marketing specialist for Snohomish County. I don't know if marketing specialist captures all I do for the county. I wear a lot of different hats. I think what I do a lot of is content creation, writing, blogging, photographing, but I kind of came into this role organically. I don't just market Snohomish County. I'm also a stakeholder, a resident I live in Everett. I've always kind of been into hiking in the outdoors, so it feels like a very natural thing for me to create video and blogs about that. And so I just sort of this position, sort of found me, and now I'm in government, and I do other more government things, but I really love the content creation and promoting a place that I love. Yeah,

Nick: 2:10

my name is Nick Shekeryk, and I am also a marketing specialist for the Snohomish County. And, you know, I I enjoy. I'm not much of a hiker. I used to be a little bit of a hiker, but then my brother went on a hike that I used to do typically, and he said he saw a bear. So I stopped hiking, and now I stick to more of the more of the urban hikes. And, you know, I got two young kids. I got a toddler and an infant. So we do a lot of, you know, walks that are trying to find ways to run out some energy before nap time and, and I'm into that kind of stuff. And my my role here this, you know, at the county, I, you know, have same role as Richard, but do a lot of content, writing, runner, social media, social media, content and, yeah, just get to explore the county. And in our podcast is pretty cool. We get to talk to all the cool people doing cool stuff. Is Snohomish County, yes, and yeah, there's a lot of great stuff here. And like I said, been here for a couple months, and I'm very excited to be here. Yeah, that's

Jennie Flaming: 3:11

awesome. And your podcast is just a really wonderful example of really telling a story of a place I love that I love that about listening to it. Okay, so I mentioned to everybody listening that we're going to have some extra content this month about Snohomish County, especially because it's such an awesome place to hike. And Craig, I was wondering if you could tell everybody a little bit about your history with hiking in Snohomish County, and then we'll get back to Richard and Nick Well,

Craig Romano: 3:44

we go way back. So, so when I moved to Washington, I lived in Seattle for years, and I live in Mount Vernon now, so Snohomish County is right between. I've worked in Snohomish County. Matter of fact, we'll go way back. Even when I first moved out here, my very first job in Washington was at Ivars Ivers over here in North Linwood. So I taught, I was a teacher in the Edmond school district. So So Snohomish County, and I go way back, yeah. So even now, it's some of the closest accessible hikes, hiking areas for me, some incredible hiking. Get into the glacier peak wilderness and into the Henry and Jackson wilderness, two of my favorite places. So it's right here in the county. Love

Jennie Flaming: 4:26

it. Okay, cool. So one of the things that's really fun about having you guys here is to get to go a little bit, you know, probably lots of people who are listening have done a hike in Snohomish County, but being able to go a little bit deeper about some of the things that are here beyond hiking, like cool places to stay and food and stuff like that. But um, Richard, could you start by just telling us about some of your favorite hikes here? Yeah, absolutely.

Richard: 4:57

I if it's all right, I'd like to start. Kind of zoomed out. How we conceive of the delay of the county from a marketing perspective, because it's perfect. It's 2000 square miles. There's a lot to cover, yeah. So generally we have these, what we call visitor regions, but we kind of have this still Sauk river valleys lumped together, which is north northeast County. And then I should also explain that our county is also very diverse in that it's it's urban on the west and rural on the east. So what I'm talking about more rural areas. And then in the southeast, we have the skykomish and the homage River Valley, so two different watersheds bisected by mountains. I've heard our our stretch of the Cascades, referred to as North Cascades, and I've heard it at the central cascades. So somewhere, somewhere in between there, yeah, we also have, notably the mountain loop Highway, which are, if your listeners haven't heard of that, it's this 55 mile loop that goes from the town of granite, falls out to Darrington in Arlington. It's classified as a scenic byway. And I should point out too it's closed seasonally. So it's actually closed right now when there's snow, they close the gate, but during this late spring and summer, they open that up. You can drive 55 miles, and there are trailheads all along the mountain loop highway. There's so much hiking out there that is probably the place I go like 80% of the time in the summer. It's beautiful out there. Yeah, so did I answer your question? Yeah? Okay, yeah, that's great.

Jennie Flaming: 6:34

So what's your favorite hike on the mountain loop highway? Mm, hmm, yeah.

Richard: 6:39

And our we had a an interview before this for our podcast, and Craig was talking about dispersal. I think that's really important. Like, we have some real hits that the hits as in, like, popular hikes, that the trailheads kind of get overrun, that are very they're too popular, yeah. So name those on this podcast.

Jennie Flaming: 6:59

It'll be like the lake that must not be

Craig Romano: 7:00

named. Give this joke about a certain lake near Leavenworth that we refuse to name it because it is the Instagram famous hike is it will not be named, you know? Yeah, so there isn't exactly so I know you're probably referring to a lake number that I won't mention, and also a mountain that, in its its sale, that Salish in it Chinook jargon would mean a Red River. So we won't talk about that. So anybody knows there shouldn't figure out what I'm talking about. Okay,

Richard: 7:34

yeah, yep, that's exactly what I'm talking about, actually. So I was hoping to call out some, some of the deeper cuts from, you know, they're more intermediate. I don't know if they're advanced, but some of the hikes I like are further back on the loop, and they have quite a bit of elevation gain. So one that I absolutely love is Gothic basin,

Craig Romano: 7:55

my 100 classics, yeah, yeah,

Richard: 7:57

yeah. The elevation gain is pretty steep. It's,

Craig Romano: 7:57

yeah. But in both those areas too, they're so think it's like 1000 feet per mile. So it's, switch back, rugged because they're mining history. The trails were never switch back, switch back, switch back. And you cross three creeks. There's some rock scrambling. But once you get to the top, there's these basins full of water and fields of Heather. And you can hike up to the actual Gothic basin it. I don't really know how to describe it. Maybe, maybe you should check out our tourism website and look at pictures of it, because my buddies and I hiked, there. You hike right on the shore. You know, we pitched our tent. You woke up and there was sun on the rocks, and this, this crystal and water. So that's, that's one of my favorites, has gone through basin, and we combined that. It was a three day backing backpacking trip. We combined that with us a scramble up Vesper peak, which is six hours and 221 feet. It's a little bit technical. So if you're advanced and looking to do or not intermediate and looking for something that's a little more advanced, I that is Vesper peak is super cool, built as recreation trails. They were built for mining. So there's old mines out. There's a lot of history. You know, there's probably some haunts people talk about, but Vesper is incredible, too. It's one of the few places in the area I've seen ptarmigans. Oh, so one

Richard: 9:22

other one that I wrote down, it's, it's also kind of a deep cut, um, out on the mountain loop. Or, I thought it was because if you go to the trailhead for Mount Dickerman, Mount dickerman's A very popular hike, and, like well deserved, it's incredible. But I always noticed when I parked there, there was this Trailhead on the other side of the parking lot for the Perry Creek Trail, which is a lot easier. It's more easy to access, but it takes you through this sort of I can't remember the exact word for it's a it's a preserve for ferns and wildflowers. It was set aside decades ago, and scientists from all over the world come to study like the natural. Um, so it's really cool to see these types of ferns that look almost alien, but it's a very gradual incline, and you can just call it there, or you can do a bunch of Switch switch backs and go back up to forgotten peak, which is a very cool hike too. And

Craig Romano: 10:16

very technical, very technical, very technical. Yeah, and it's and you can also do still Guam I've done still Guam ish mountain from there, when you get up, before you get to the this is in my book. I have this in my day hiking North Cascade book. Great trail. But before you get to the meadows to go to forgotten, there is a trail that goes to the left. It's officially abandoned, but it's used. You can hike that two miles, yeah, a ridge, non technical, which, it's spectacular. And then you can scramble up still Amish mountain peak there too, that. So next year up there, check that out. So both those, those peaks you can do from that trail. And as you were saying, too, you'll be on this will be a few people, and there'll be 100 people up on Mount Dickerman. 90% of the cars in the parking lot are for Dickerman. So it's a great alternative. Yeah,

Richard: 11:02

cool. So that that that's the mountain loop, and then out highway two, we're talking about the Snohomish, skykomish river valleys. There's lots of very popular hikes out there that I won't name either,

Jennie Flaming: 11:14

other lakes and mountains that stay nameless. Yeah, yeah. If

Richard: 11:17

you just go on the WTA website, you can find all of them. One that was really cool my friend and I did before the bolt Creek fire. I don't know if it actually. Don't know if it's open now, but maybe you know Blanca Lake

Jennie Flaming: 11:30

is open. It's open. Yeah, that is a great hike, yeah.

Richard: 11:35

Um, speaking of switchbacks, but, um, the thing about Blanca Lake is the the water is, like this gem green, or like a mill. It's milky because it has like runoff, but I don't know the color of it's fantastic. It doesn't look real.

Craig Romano: 11:51

Yeah, it doesn't look Blanca either.

Richard: 11:56

I really enjoyed that hike. And you have to, you kind of have to go back on these forest service roads. It's not intuitive. I think it might also be accessible from the the the trail pass, index

Craig Romano: 12:10

well, yeah, the North Fork, Sky commish. Not that roads been reopened, yeah, that's much easier to get to. Now, used to have to come in from Sky commish, which, which? You still do, but there's no reason to do that. Now, the road they have, the road has been reopened, and it's paved almost until the very end, so you only have a couple miles at the end. That's that's gravel, but, yeah, it's excellent. Another one of my under classic hikes, Blanca is wonderful. The

Richard: 12:37

other thing I like about that, too, is once you get to the top of the trailhead. It has a really great view of glacier peak, which isn't always visible. You know, sometimes you have to go back a bit to find it, because it hides from the Everett side of things, the city side of things. It's the fourth largest peak in the state, but it's kind of elusive unless you go a little bit into the mountain loop looking for it. Yeah.

Jennie Flaming: 13:01

Cool. Cool. Any others, Richard, that you want to call out before we go to some more urban ones with Nick? Um,

Richard: 13:09

I think I'll, I'll play the rest of them close to the chest. But, oh, I should say, on the Darrington side of the mountain loop, there's some great hiking too. There's, like, the boulder, Boulder Creek.

Unknown: 13:18

Oh, yeah, wilderness, yeah, yeah. The old like, I

Richard: 13:21

think it has one of the highest concentrations of old growth forest. Yeah, there. So, yeah, there's, there's lots of hiking out there to the white Chuck trail is another one. It's

Craig Romano: 13:32

a good one for sometimes it's, it's snow free too. So it's a good one you can do right now. It'll be open. The white Chuck is, it's pretty low. I think it's about six and a half miles one way. Okay, and it, yeah, you can, you can hike there almost year round. That's, that's a really good one. Yeah,

Richard: 13:48

I've heard of mountain goats up there. I haven't seen them myself, but, oh, you're

Unknown: 13:52

talking about white Chuck mountain. I was talking about white Chuck River. Oh, yeah, yeah. White Chuck Mountain is more technical, okay, yeah, it's not open right now. It's not year round. And it's, yeah, no, I thought with the white Chuck River Trail, yeah, okay, yeah. Is pretty basic accessible. But yes, there are goats on on white Chuck mountain. That whole I call them that the you're in so much counter. I call them the three matter horns. So you have mount pew, Mount white Chuck and Sloan. And when you look, and they look, they have that pinnacle. So in matter of fact, no matter where you are in the North Cascades, when you're hiking, you can pick those out so you can kind of get an idea. They're my markers when I'm trying to figure out where everything is so very, very stink. They're all pretty close to each other, yeah, three matter horns. Yeah,

Richard: 14:33

yeah. I want to you're talking on our on our podcast, a little bit about the history of hiking, and I find that really interesting, too. I love mount pew for its history, because there used to be a fire lookup lookout up there. And these old fire lookouts, like the people of Darrington, were very hardy. And there's this legend that this guy, I think his name is Nels Bruce, yeah, he would camp up there, right? And, and a fire lookout back then was, it was a tent on the side of a mountain. It's exposed.

Craig Romano: 15:03

of the hardest hikes, too. And again, it was, it had mining history too. There was a they would run cables down for the ore, but you have to go over that knife edge above the glacier, and then to get to the summit, the tread is kind of sliding out right now. It's a white knuckler. It's not recommended for everybody. It's an incredible, incredible hike to get up there. But, yeah, can you imagine sleeping up there? Yeah. No, no, I cannot.

Richard: 15:29

The legend is this Nels Bruce, that he's sort of, he's sort of a, I don't, I don't know how much is fact and how much is folklore. Like. He's kind of become this larger than life character out there. But the legend is he would camp out up there and look for fires. But then he would run into town, like, all the way down the mountain and into Darrington, you know, for like, social events. And then when he was done courting ladies, he would go run back up the hill.

Jennie Flaming: 15:55

Yeah, our sponsor for the month of April is Snohomish County tourism. Snohomish County, Washington offers 2000 square miles of majestic mountains, flowing rivers, bustling cities and towns and sweeping coastlines, not to mention great access to hikes only minutes from Seattle, whether you're into short one hour hikes, full day treks or overnight excursions. Hikers of all skill levels are invited to experience the vast terrains and breathtaking high mountain scenery of Snohomish County. It also makes a great base camp for day trips to America's most stunning national parks, including North Cascades Mount Rainier and Olympic Speaking of which, the national parks, forests and public lands in and around Snohomish County are some of the most beautiful places to explore, and they need our care. For more information on how you can recreate responsibly, Leave No Trace and protect our natural resources. Visit Seattle North country.com you can also follow Seattle North Country on social media at Seattle North Country, that's one word with no punctuation. You can also tag at Seattle north country or use the hashtag visit snow co to get your snow co adventures featured on their social accounts. Thank you so much. Snohomish County tourism for sponsoring us for the month of April. Nick tell us about some of your favorite more urban trails. All right.

Nick: 17:34

County. All right. One of my favorite because, you know, I live in Everett, is the mill town trail. It's about seven miles, and it does a nice loop around North Everett, and you get to see like Port Gardner Bay and and the Snohomish river certain points. And also, it's awesome, you know, being on a trail, and be able to see the Cascades, yeah, you know, to the to the east, and then looking over the West, went over the sound and seeing the Olympics. It's just, it's beautiful. And on a beautiful day, it's just like nothing better than that. Yeah, and, you know, they got some parks. They got a couple parks there. Like, Buck scar Park is a nice place to, you know, take, I usually go with my kids, so it's nice place to take the kids and let them kind of just, you know, run out some energy and stuff. And, you know, on the on the Port of Everett, there's a lot of places to eat there as well. Like, you know, there's the fisherman jacks and which does, like, like, Asian fusion food, that's really good. And there's the jetty, Jetty Island, or, sorry, the jetty Bar and Grill. It's, like, you know, your Bar and Grill there. And, yeah, there's, it's nice. It's a nice place to do a hike. And, you know, you can walk, you know, a couple miles or whatever, and then, and then just stop, replenish, and then keep going. Yeah, yeah, those are kind of hikes, the kind that

Jennie Flaming: 18:49

have a food stop in the

Nick: 18:51

middle exactly. I don't need to pack the 10 essentials, because they're all around me.

Craig Romano: 18:59

You see the credit card. Love it,

Nick: 19:06

yeah. And one of the other ones go down to go to Japanese Gulch. And it's, it's very beautiful. It feels like, you know, you're in a city, but it feels like you're out in the forest and out in like a feels like a, yeah. It's just, it's just incredible. It's very peaceful. And, you know, you see some, sometimes you'll see some woodpeckers or some black tailed deer running around. And it's, yeah, great place to see some wildlife, you know, in the, in a, in this urban area. And, you know, it has a, it has a, if you're, you know, if you have a dog, is a dedicated dog park there fun, yeah, at the at the foot of the trails, and yeah, it has a pretty cool history to, you know, started is owned by the by the muckle Tio Lumber Company. And it used to be kind of a place where people would live when they were, where the mill workers would live. And think got the name, because a lot of them the workers they were. Japanese happen to be people live there,

Craig Romano: 20:02

you know. So a lot of discrimination too. That was, like one of the few places where a lot of them could live too, yeah. And there's been a lot of archeological digs in there, finding relics from, from, from that period when, when it was, in essence, a company town type of thing, gentlemen, yeah, and it was under threat of development not too long ago, maybe about 1012, years ago. So it's a big movement to protect that, because it's one of the last Green Belt areas between Everett and muckle teal. So it's got a lot of history on that. Yeah, wonderful place.

Nick: 20:36

Yeah, it's a beautiful place. And, like, you know, it's a great place to go for a run. I think I said there's about four miles of trails. And, yeah, there's a, there's pretty popular running club there that does that meets and does some trail running. And yeah, it's just, it's a beautiful place. And again, after, after you go there, you know, you're in this place where you feel like you're in the middle of, you know, in middle of the real, real wilderness. And then go out, and then we go down to the muckle, to landing, and go to Ivers and get some, get some clam chopper, perfect. Yeah. And one of my other ones, I like. It's, it's kind of a shorter hike, but a flowing lake on Snohomish. It's not, this is really urban, but for me it is because my, my sister in law lives out there. She lives on the lake. So it's kind of like we're gonna go hang out there and then take the kids again, just, you know, not too far away, and just go on on the little trails there. And, you know, they got, like, it's one of the only places in the area where you can do, like, you could have motorized water crafts, which is pretty cool. So, you know, who do, like, jet skiing and stuff sometimes. And yeah, you could, you could swim in the lake, which is really cool. So, and there's beaches and parks and amphitheater and just really cool place for, you know, they got something for everybody. It's really fun. Yeah, yeah. And then another place to go to is Lord Hill in Snohomish, yeah, I talked about a little bit on the on the last podcast, or the one with us, and, yeah, you know, they got the beaver the Beaver Lake Trail and the temple Lake loop, which is, I guess, a pond. They're both ponds, I guess. So. I'm not sure why they I'm not sure difference between a pond and a lake is but semantics.

Jennie Flaming: 22:19

I think of a pond as being smaller, but I don't know,

Nick: 22:22

yeah, yeah, but it's nice. There's the forest out there, there's some ravines and some wetlands, and it's just, it's just a beautiful place. And, yeah, it's not, not a lot of elevation gains. So that's nice too, because when I got the pack on with the kids, so yes, yeah, the nice thing, you know, another nice thing about is, like, you know, the base of it is, like, there's a pretty good hill there. I think that's Lord Hill. And, and, yeah, it's a nice place to also run around. There's a big, big grassy knoll on the on the parking lot side to go play, and a little bit like a big rock to climb on. So cool. Yeah,

Jennie Flaming: 22:59

that's always a kid winner is rocks to climb on, yep,

Nick: 23:03

just stand there. It's like, we're not gonna go hiking today. We're just gonna go to the, stay at the at the base and just play in the rock. That was our that was our activity today. Yeah, awesome. Yeah. And another one in the city is, I go to Lynnwood and go to Picnic Point Park. It's, it's not necessarily a trail, but you got to take a big like pedestrian bridge, and it's a very long walk, so it I kind of count as a trail, yeah, yeah. And you get over there and there's a nice beach and places to have picnic, and really beautiful views of the Olympics. And, you know, get to see the trains go by, which is pretty cool, yeah, yeah. And let's see. What else do we go to? Yeah, we spend a lot of time just trying to find places to just like I said, just keep, keep the kids going. And, yeah, get, get out of the house and do some stuff. We go to Centennial Trail sometimes. And, you know, like you mentioned earlier, that one, that one goes 30 miles, and, you know, 60 miles round trip, you've gone on bike ride. It's really nice. But, we'll do little stretches of it and kind of down more toward the snow mission. Then we'll stop by the trails and tap house and, you know, go get a good beer and let the kids play around for a bit. And, yeah, it's a nice it's nice to, yeah, it's just nice to get out. And there's so many places around here to go, to go on walks and little hikes. And, yeah, you know, maybe like to make a little older and I get a little comfortable again, I go and do some of these awesome Mountain Heights hikes on the loop and stuff that'd be fun. But

Craig Romano: 24:28

even in this area, too, Nick, there's so much more this where I have to do my shameless plug, my urban trails. Every urban trails, Every book has all those places you talked about, places that it's amazing so that people live in these areas all this time and not even, not even familiar. You know, up near Arlington, there's some great, great parks on along the stillquamish River for hiking in there in Monroe, matter of fact, was one of tiny Lake, which was, it was done. Of the during the highways they were built. So it's kind of old quarry, and it became the Green Belt. And now there's a trail around that. And it's pretty much the demarcation between the urban growth area and farmland. And now you've got this trail system through there, over in Sultan you've got the Osprey trails. Again, it was, it was it was mitigation for the dam they put. So it's a great place to see, see salmon. So yeah, all these places that, even in Forest Park in Everett and you never is interesting. Forest Park is really small, but I was able to do a 5k run, especially doing these trails going back and forth, back and forth. So even in this small park, but yeah, they're right here, the Lowell Trail, which is an old rail Railroad Trail on the bend to the river, is another great, great place right in this area. So, yeah, sometimes it's, you know, if you don't have time to go up to the mountain loop or to highway two, there's stuff right here that we tend to overlook. And what's interesting too, is sometimes these, these local trails, aren't crowded because everybody's out on the weekend. You know, out the mountains, when our local parks are have a lot of places to spend some time. Marysville, same thing. There's some new trails that are built over there. And, yeah, just check it out. I mean, just getting out right in your backyard. Another

Nick: 26:18

one. We didn't, we didn't take but we drove by and saw the other day was we were up in Stan, would go into Camino Island, and we saw port Susan trail, yeah. Oh,

Craig Romano: 26:26

that's great, yeah, Camino, yeah. And Camino is included in my book as well. Commando got some great, great nights. The Whidbey Camano Land Trust has been doing some amazing there's Barnum point, which is an absolutely spectacular park there. It's fairly new, but there's a lot of walking on commando Island. Yeah, I know that's out of the county, but you have to go through Snohomish County, yeah, and then you're gonna stop in Stanwood on the way back, the only place that it's

Nick: 26:52

a one way in, one way out, exactly. Yeah, yeah,

Jennie Flaming: 26:55

right. So that's kind of a nice segue. So Nick, you gave us some good food ideas already some of your urban trails. Um, so I'd love to hear maybe going back to you, Richard for some, some favorite local food spots that hikers might not be aware of that are really nice for, like, on your way back, what are some good places to check out? Yeah,

Richard: 27:20

I want to start by answering your question in kind of a roundabout way, because just to tie it back a little bit, Craig, you're talking about some of the stories of these places and how these trails came to be. One hike I should have mentioned out on Highway two. It's pretty popular. People know about it, but the haybrook Ridge lookout started as a trail to a lookout, and lookout still there. I bring this up because that Ridge has a really interesting history that was also supposed to be clear cut, and the city of index, they rallied together and they were able to preserve it, and now it's this fantastic hiking trail. So if I can just riff on the idea of index for a while after you do that hike, or there's other fantastic hikes nearby. You can go into index, and they have the Bush House in it's this fully restored, and from the 1800s that they painstakingly restored. You can read about it on our tourism website, like according to the folks who did the restoration work, the roof was going to collapse within a year if they didn't intervene. And so they, they jacked it up, dug all the mud out from underneath, fully restored it, and now there's a restaurant in there. And I probably should have written down the name of the restaurant, but it's a farm to table restaurant, and so after your hike, just, just go into index and check it out, or, um, grab a cup of coffee at espresso chalet, right off of Highway two. That's also pretty popular, but it's famous because the giant Bigfoot statues, that's where Harry and the Hendersons was filmed. And they really lean into that as sort of a tourist trap, but it's so much fun, just as kitsch. I see it on social media a lot, everything Bigfoot. And then you get your coffee, and you can go out to this little deck, and all of a sudden, you look up and it's the side of Mount index completely covered in mist and snow. And it's just like you weren't, you weren't expecting that right off the highway. Yeah, yeah. So that's, that's index. I wanted to plug them. But to answer your question, we really think about and kind of position Everett and Lynwood is sort of the base camp for jumping off, for hiking adventures. So a lot of the good, better dining, in my estimation, is here. And no offense to the river valleys. But one thing I would recommend before you go out the Everett has the SNO Isle natural foods Co Op. So if you're looking for, like, great snacks, they have this bulk section. They have really healthy treats. Throw them in your backpack. We talked about on the last podcast about packing more food than you think is necessary. Yes. So for provisions, that's what I'd recommend for coming back after a hike, I wanted to plug something else on the waterfront, like Nick was talking about. Um, there's a place called the muse. It's newer it was. It's inside the former offices, offices of the Weyerhaeuser mill. So it says historic house that also served as a showroom for the Weyerhaeuser company. So they had all the different types of molding and woodwork and window casings. So it says fantastically preserved building that they flipped and now it's a cafe by day, and speak easy by night, and it's right, right in boxcar park where Nick was talking about. And you can sit there drink coffee. The Marina is right outside, and it's really not uncommon to see harbor seals pop up, and I've seen sea lions there. So, yeah, that's a place I would, I would plug.

Jennie Flaming: 30:47

Another I'm gonna say this isn't related to hiking, but because we're recording at your office, the first time I met you guys and you took me to narrative coffee, which is, so this is downtown Everett, right? It's, it's not on the way to a trail, I realize that. But that biscuit sandwich, especially if you add the bacon and the avocado, that was, like, definitely worth driving a long time for. Yeah, some good food. Say that. Thank you for introducing me to that

Craig Romano: 31:17

yeah and a hike to get you guys to come down here. I know that Nick, I saw one of your blogs. You talked about it, one of the coolest experiences in Washington. And my only complaint is the access needs to be longer. Is Jetty Island, and that's if you're not familiar Jetty Island. Basically, it's a man made Island when they dredge the river and but it's over two miles long now. And when the tides are low, the tide flats are incredible. You can go out forever on this thing, and the correct me, I'm right here the parks department. Or is it? The city has a ferry, a passenger ferry, that goes out there the city, the city has it, but it's only this is my big complaint. They only run it from like the Fourth of July to Labor Day, which is insane, because the weather is good from April till October, and everyone's going to be out there. So I really wish they'd say, if you're listening, please expand that, because it's really cool. And you can go out there and obviously just set up a blanket in a bucket, and you need to bring everything, because nothing out there. You got to bring everything out there, go out there. But you can walk. I've walked four miles out there. I mean, when the tides are low, you can watch, and the birds are out there, and again, you're in the harbor, you wouldn't even know that, and you're looking out at at Whidbey Island and the Olympics. It is truly a great experience. It just needs to have longer access, it

Nick: 32:32

seems, of its own climate. There, it's like, it's like, warm there. It's like, an actual, like, a beach experience, warmer there.

Craig Romano: 32:37

Yeah, yeah. So if you've never been there, it's really, it is really cool. And, yeah, I definitely make the effort to check it out. Yeah, Jennie Island, and that is also in my urban trails, every book. Oh, cool. Okay,

Jennie Flaming: 32:52

so what about cool places to stay, right? So, you know, we do have listeners from all over Washington, but a lot of you listening are in the greater Seattle area or Bellingham or Vancouver or the other thing, either Vancouver. So I'd love to know like, for somebody who's like, ooh, this actually sounds kind of awesome. If I did want to make a weekend out of it. What are some of the cool, kind of unique places people could stay in Snohomish County? Well,

Nick: 33:26

the first thing that comes to mind are those a frame cabins up in there and up in index. I believe cool, bringing back to index. But yeah, it's, they're very, is they're very, you know, social media, Instagram worthy, and, yeah, they're very beautiful. And it seems like there's a, yeah, they seem like they're, they're really popular. Totally,

Jennie Flaming: 33:43

yeah, yeah, you

Richard: 33:45

took mine. Totally, like, because it's such a great thing. Um, we actually do a campaign around it in the fall, like, all these cabins out in the index area, but there's, like, shipping container cabins. There's a geodesic dome that's out there all in Airbnb. But yeah, I'm 100% that was top of my head. It's really cool to stay out and index and you can just go down to the skykomish river. But for a more urban or waterfront option, I'd like to plug the Hotel Indigo, which is right on the Everett waterfront, like right by the marina. Yeah, it's more modern. They have this, I think they have a saltwater swimming pool. They have a cafe built in there, or full restaurant, but it's right, right on that the mill town trail that Nick is talking about. So you can go right out on the marina, and there's a bakery, there's dim sum, they're opening a fish and chip spot. Like there's a lot of development happening, yeah? And you can stay in one place and access it all, yeah.

Nick: 34:49

And in the hotel is the Jetty cafe. And

Jennie Flaming: 34:53

yeah, the one that's the one you talked yeah for, Yep, yeah. And

Nick: 34:56

there's like a splash pad there in the summer, Oh, yeah. It's just beautiful. Cool? Yeah, I

Jennie Flaming: 35:01

don't know where splash pads were when. I mean, they didn't make sense yet when I was a kid, but I still feel a little better about it every time I see one. I'm like, this is fun, yeah, I would have been so into this. Yeah, yeah,

Nick: 35:13

the one I used to see, I think, was the one at Seattle Center,

Jennie Flaming: 35:17

oh, yeah, the International Fountain, yeah, it's pretty fun. That's a classic. Yeah. The

Richard: 35:23

other waterfront lodging property I want to mention too, is the Silver Cloud Inn and Mukilteo, which is built on, it's built like, on pilings, like right above, it's literally above the water, and the ferry used to stop right there. Now it stops further down the beach. But that one's really cool, because you're literally on the water, yep.

Jennie Flaming: 35:43

And speaking of history, that whole, you know, we talked about Ivers before, but that's also right there in Mukilteo, is where the Treaty of point Elliot was signed, which is, like those listening, if you're not familiar with that, that's an important thing to research, I think, for Washingtonians, because it goes to kind of where land issues between indigenous people and white colonists were kind of, I don't know that I want to use the word resolved. I don't think that's quite the right word. But like, there are so many things in Washington today, not just Snohomish County, but like, all over, especially Western Washington, that kind of trace back to that

Craig Romano: 36:25

time. I think it was 1855 Yeah,

Jennie Flaming: 36:27

I believe that's right. Yeah,

Unknown: 36:28

yeah. I know why you're still talking about mukilteo, the another historic layer that a lot of people might not be familiar with, the big Gulch Trail, which is near the library. If you had looked at maps of that area back in the 1960s they were known as the chevron park lands, because originally that area was considered for a refinery. So so again, imagine how that would have been really again, it's amazing when you look at, you know, the land now, all the stories, all different layers of this area. So yeah, who would think now you've got this Gulch that you go down to and you feel like you're you're out in the middle of nowhere, again, you can't see the development around, but that could have been part of a very, very large industrial operation. So yeah, wow.

Jennie Flaming: 37:16

Well, do you guys have anything else you want to share with us about some of these critical places people should go in Snohomish County. Have we covered everything?

Nick: 37:28

There's just a lot, you know, Lynwood is a pretty big cultural area for food, yeah, lot of stuff to explore down there, if you like. And you know, Everett has some really cool spots, you know, yeah, to, you know, Anthony's, it's a chain, but it's a really good, you know, yeah, it's a local chain. Yeah, really good seafood there. It's right on the right, on the water, you know, right along the mill town trail. So, you know, one of those bonus places again, you stop and just, you know, get a drink, get some clam chowder. Check out the seals and have a good time. And, yeah, there's a yeah, there's just a lot of food in the area. And make me hungry right now, because

Jennie Flaming: 38:09

I know I need to make a lunch plan. Yeah. Oh, love it. Well, um, so tell everybody how they can follow along with more outdoor adventures, food, dining, cultural events in Snohomish County. Tell everybody just a little about where to find your podcast and other things you want to share. You

Nick: 38:30

can find our podcast on on on Spotify and on Apple podcast. It's called Snohomish County place makers,

Richard: 38:38

yeah, and we have much more tourism content at Seattle North Country, on the social channels and at our website, www.seattlenorthcountry.com I should also mention because this is probably people who will be listening down the road, we will be rebranding and not be known as Seattle north country anymore. So if you just type in Snohomish County Tourism into your web browser, you should be able to find us whatever we're called in the future. Yes,

Jennie Flaming: 39:04

and we'll, we'll update the show notes too, with whatever your new URL is cool. Well, Richard and Nick, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank

Unknown: 39:16

you, absolutely. Thank you.