Road (and trail) trip: Escapes from Seattle on Seafair weekend

We had spent a Sunday in August atop Skyline Divide, a glorious ridge crest hike just north of Mount Baker, the day so clear we could gaze out all the way past tidewater and summits in the Olympics.

A mandatory return stop, Graham's Store in Glacier for a beer: Check that, two brewskis. Our party walked in, and there were familiar Seattle faces, including SeattlePI columnist and coworker Emmett Watson.

They were observing a local ritual. Just as folks flock to Lake Washington to watch the Blue Angels and hydroplane races, lots of us leave town to get away from the hydro races.

With a years-honed knowledge of escape routes, here are a few suggestions:

--Whidbey Island, Double Bluff Beach and Ebey's Landing: Catch an early Sunday ferry, drive up island to Double Bluff Road (just short of Freeland) and do a glorious beach walk. The Cascades are behind you. The Olympics are in front of you. The Seattle skyline looms, heat/hazy to the south. Bald eagles glare down at you.

Road trip: Keeping cool on the Oregon Coast

Drive up island, bring fixings for a picnic lunch at South Whidley State Park. Then hop over to St. Augustine's-in-the-Woods Episcopal Church, where the Whidbey Island Music Festival is winding up with a 3 p.m. Sunday concert featuring works Handel. Lingering lets the ferry line shrink.

--Vancouver, B.C., Pride Festival: March, witness or hang out: All options are available. Sunset Beach has main stage entertainment, a beer garden and a family area.

Canada's most prominent straight guy, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, has marched in the 2016 and 2018 Vancouver parades, and made political history this week as the first PM to down a beer at a gay bar.

--Mount Baker: Great high hikes have melted free, from Yellow Aster Meadows -- trailhead reached before the Twin Lakes Road gets awful -- to the Skyline. Bring water on latter hike. Or do the Chain Lakes loop from the top of the Mount Baker Highway.

Stop by Glacier on your way down. Do not lift too many cups, since you will have to negotiate a twisting uphill turn at Maple Falls, and two 90-degree turns at Zender corner, plus a likely speed trap going back into Bellingham.

--Maple Pass and Cutthroat Pass, North Cascades Highway: Drive up to Rainy Pass, 'where you will see too roads. The south leads to picnic area, and trailhead for the Maple Pass Loop, a gloriously popular romp through meadows with Glacier Peak as backdrop.

On the north side of state Route 20, Cutthroat Pass, a gently graded four-mile hike, sees less use. At the top, you get both Glacier Peak and nearby mass of Silver Star. Mountain goats often seen. Bring water, and watch weather. Silver Star gets whacked by thunder storms.

--Dungeness Spit: The Edmonds-Kingston ferry dictates an early departure and late return. But, the world's longest sandspit is wonderfully cool on a hot day, with a backdrop of Mount Angeles and the Olympics, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and its shipping traffic in front of you, and lots of bird life.

Allow for hang time out at the lighthouse, and back where trail hits the beach. And hunt up Jose's in Sequim for a knockout Mexican meal.

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--Burroughs Mountain at Mount Rainier: The trail takes off from Sunrise, and heads for three summits. Burroughs 1 and 2 look out toward Little Tahoma and the Emmons Glacier. Burroughts 3 is tougher, dropping 600 vertical feet from B-2, then gaining 1,000 to the 7,800' summit.

Wow! You look half a vertical mile down to the Winthrop Glacier. The most dramatic face of the mountain, Liberty Ridge and the Willis Wall, are in your face. An occasional cloud floats up and over the crest.

Hydro weekend was once root of a cross-Cascades exchange of backyards. My friend Dick worked for the Wenatchee National Forest, and spent much of the week outdoors. He loves the hydro races, and would head west to Seattle.

In turn, I would often head for the Wenatchee National Forest, and put Mount Stuart between myself and Lake Washington.

We would give each other a good-natured bad time, which is good basis for a friendship.