Port Townsend is empty, mostly, and the rain is a persistent fine drizzle that soaks through everything, my hat, my gloves, the gaps between the buttons in my coat… It’s windy too, and to add insult to injury, nearly everything is closed save the Safeway and the Starbucks. The wharf is deserted until a stocky guy rushes a seagull and aggressively snaps pictures of the same bird we saw just a few minutes earlier pulling trash out of the dumpster behind a waterfront seafood restaurant.
I haven’t been to these port towns in winter and while I am complaining about the damp, the truth is that there is something undeniably appealing about a tourist town off season under a pall of gray.
And I love the drive out here – we pass huge red madrone trees and scraggly evergreens. Out the car window, J sees a bald eagle standing on sand bank.
It’s the entropy – shingled rooftops given to moss, the decaying history of the automobile from 40s delivery vans to 50s roadsters to 60s pickups to 70s Japanese econoboxes all rusting away in mechanic lots and outside dilapidated red barns. Muddy cattle roam fields that are patchwork with dirty snow. All the colors are so complete.
Standing on the wharf, I look down and see how clear the green water is, but when I turn my eyes toward the horizon, there is almost no difference in color at the place where the water meets the sky.
Twittered it, but wishing you and J an ‘official’ Happy New Year! Vowing to be a better commenter in 2009. 😉 Lovely photo.
What a lovely meditative post Pam! I also like nothing better than summer resorts in winter. There is something really appealing in a melancholic kind of way.
I agree, there is something fascinating about seaside towns in winter, much like ski resorts in the summer – especially when so many of them stay open, but with next to no guests…
I must say I did have a little giggle when I first read the article, as I misread it as ‘Pete Townsend is empty,mostly,…’.