Tulips and tourists blooming in La Conner

Tourist tulip season was in full bloom in La Conner Monday. On Monday!

The Third Street parking lot was almost full at 3 p.m. with a steady stream of visitors heading toward downtown. Auto traffic on First Street was slowed by cheek to jowl curbside parking.

On the boardwalk, folks streamed by in both directions. People were picnicking at every boardwalk pocket park and the Seafood and Prime Rib and Waterfront Cafe patios were full. The Sliders Cafe was slammed. They had to power through with paper orders to the cook and cash transactions settling customers’ bills: their Wi-Fi was down.

The town was full of people of all ages, whether in strollers, on bicycles or using canes or walkers. Folks were of many colors, genders and nationalities. Some wore the garb of their home countries. Some wore spandex. At least one proudly tipped his Navy baseball cap. Bicycle helmets were on heads, under arms and on picnic tables. All kinds of water bottles abounded.

And, of course. there were dogs, their owners sometimes seeking water for them.

Hands were held, couple walked arm in arm and some snuggling occurred.

The weather was much improved from the weekend’s wind and rain, but it wasn’t that warm, there was never a blue sky, and the sun was sometimes bright but was often weakly reaching the ground through gauzy clouds.

In other words, a perfect merchant day in this tulip, er tourist, town.