“Maaaaaaaat. What’s the county seat of Wahkiakum County?”

Some 23 years ago I was a freshman at Kennewick High and had to suffer the indignity of taking Washington State History. It’s not like Washington has much history compared to the rest of the nation and it seemed ludicrous that while a Maryland freshmen was studying the historical significant of The Battle of Antietam, I was forced to spend two weeks on the signicance of Whitman missionaries getting too pious with the local Indians and getting their pushy butts massacred.

To top it off my teacher, Addie Verner, had a serious prediliction for quoting straight from her “Teacher’s Edition” textbook …..clinging to it like a talisman to ward off 9th grade apathy.

It didn’t work very well.

If it were not for Spring and the appearance of short-shorts on increasingly shape-shapely girls…..I fear I would have gone AWOL.  Whatever the answer was to Wahkiakum I missed it that day.  Sigh.
Somehow months later I somehow crammed all 39 county seats into my head mustered an A- out of the class.  However, fast forward 23 years and I couldn’t tell you half of the county names, let alone their county seats.  Hell, the only way I know it’s even 39 counties is because I just Googled it.

“It’s Cathlamet Miss Verner!”

…although I think she’d disapprove of the Internet if she’s still alive today.

There is however a new chapter to this life story.

Yeah, I’m in the IBR, but that’s not until August and I’ve got a bunch of time before the Utah 1088 in June. I’ve been growing a seed of an idea all last fall and think I’ve got a plan. What would it take to ride to all 39 county seats? I’ve got a spiffy new Olympus E-500 I’d like to use in the IBR. How about if I take a picture of each courthouse? What route would I take, how many miles would it be, and how long would it take?

With the of counties and seats in hand I plugged them into Microsoft Streets and Trips and came up with the following first-cut route.


My first thought was…..”Wow. This is doable with a two day ride! Perfect for a 3 day weekend…..before Memorial Day.”

Looking at the basic route I saw several tricky counties. First was San Juan County at Friday Harbor. Getting stuck to wait a ferry cycle while in the middle of a route would be maddening as an LD rider. Maybe I’ll start the trip here.

I fiddled with some more routes and found variations in the 1700 mile range….which presents the second dilemma….or opportunity depending on how one looks at it. Clearly more than 1500 and less than 2000. Does one try and get them all in less than 36 hours and call it a Bun Burner or does one add on some extra miles at the end and call it a Saddle Sore 2000?

I’m hopeful that I can start the ride and have the option as the end approaches to make the decision. If I’m behind pace with a Bun Burner with all the mucking around of snapping pictures….it would be helpful to have 300 miles at the end of just a pure road blasting to bring things back on a 2K in 2 day schedule.

With basic cities down it’s now time to start actually finding the exact addresses of the courthouses. I won’t have time on the road to wander towns to find them. Sure it’s easy in some place like Pomeroy because the town is so tiny that the courthouse is the 2nd tallest structure behind the grain silo. But Tacoma seems to change courthouses every few decades. I figure something with a plaque on and is photogenic…or at least proves I was somewhere.

Off to figure out a more detailed route and plan…..and aplan to avoid getting hassled by cops.