Making the unseen, seen.

In 2015, we began our bike journey from Anacortes, WA, on the Salish Sea. In similar fashion, my journey this year began not too far from there in Roche Harbor, WA, on San Juan Island.

Fig 1: The first step to understanding something is to make the unseen visible. Stuart Island visible from Roche Harbor, San Juan Island pop. 6822 (as of 2000).

In 2015, we began our pilgrimage from March’s Point just outside the city of Anacortes, WA. Beyond being unceded Swinomish land, March’s Point is the site of a couple major refineries, and incidentally, the terminus of the Puget Sound pipeline, the American spur of the existing Trans Mountain pipeline. The thing with pipelines and fossil fuel transport in general is that once infrastructure is laid, it’s easy to forget that it’s there. For us, March’s Point served as a mark that indeed, there was something visible to look at.

Fig 2: The Road to Athabasca crew outside March’s Point

This theme of “making the unseen, seen” became increasingly important as we made our way toward Fort McMurray, Alberta and the tar sands. Often, the only sign of a pipeline, of THE existing Trans Mountain pipeline were small signs with the Kinder Morgan logo, and the occasional visible linear cut through trees. Sometimes, signs of the pipeline were more interesting. One farmer north of Kamloops, BC, said that her cows would sleep above the pipeline as the friction of the moving diluted bitumen would heat the ground itself up and melt snow.

In future blog posts, I will show further examples highlighting what is actually there, as opposed to merely what’s visible.

Fig 3: The existing Trans Mountain pipeline sign and clear-cut

At other times, the location of a pipeline was obvious, such as the acres of blackened soil from the record-setting Nexen spill that occurred just miles from the eventual place our group stayed at our final destination.

Back to the present, on International Workers Day, May 1st, 2021, I found myself on San Juan Island with my girlfriend Amber staying (socially distanced) with a friend near the town of Roche Harbor. Roche Harbor could be described as one of the most north-westerly towns in the entire lower 48 states, being that to leave the marina and head out to sea would leave only a couple small islands between the traveler and Canada in multiple directions. Through the harbor gates, the high hills of Stuart Island were visible (Fig 1).

At its northwest tip, Stuart Island is home to the Turn Point Lighthouse, an old historic beacon long helping ships navigate the narrow turn in Haro Strait between the United States and Canada. This is the principal route for oil tankers and oil barges coming and going from Vancouver, BC. It is tricky enough that by law, an experienced local pilot must be at the helm because of the navigation hazards. Any risks here will multiply if the pipeline expansion becomes a reality.

Fig 4: Aboard the Arctic Sunrise ship, native activist Kayah George and Greenpeace oil campaigner Rachel Butler report on Turn Point, oil spills, and the power of indigenous-led action.

Amber and I enjoyed a perfect spring morning, and some particularly great donuts. Our friend’s little boy enjoyed running around in the grass, and I squawked back and forth with a talkative crow who seemed to imitate my sounds. Later that day, we collected mussels on a beach (which are also important to the local economy, generating thousands of jobs statewide), The next afternoon, we both hopped on our bikes and rode to the ferry—and got some good fundraiser miles in the books.

All the while, regardless of it being visible—beyond the fair green hills of Stuart at the end of the bay—lies a possible ground zero, and an end to the very soul of the realm.

Fig 5: Heading home and earning miles. Photo by Amber Casali. :)