Though harder to spot than the casino next to the freeway, the Tulalip Tribes’ Hibulb Cultural Center and Natural History Preserve is tucked into the Marysville trees just beyond, offering exhibits like a hall of historic canoes, a longhouse featuring recorded tales from Coast Salish storytellers, and an exhibit on how written language dovetails with the tribes’ oral traditions.

As at any good barbecue joint, Moose Creek Barbeque’s official closing time is less crucial than when they sell out of popular meats, like the juicy brisket that begins cooking the day prior. Though the entrance sits at the end of an unassuming strip mall in Smokey Point, the inside is pure barbecue bliss, with wood-
paneled walls and a giant mounted moose head.

Mount Vernon’s Farmstrong Brewing uses the surrounding Skagit Valley farmland to its advantage, including local grains in every beer—even as its flavors pull from the whole globe, with an English pale ale, a pineapple sour, and a Mexican-style Vienna lager. The taproom is equally welcoming to kids and dogs, indoor and out.

Six miles of trails curve through Sehome Hill Arboretum, a natural space next to Western Washington University’s campus. The soaring trees and a restored tunnel in a sandstone outcropping—originally excavated for Model T–era cars to putter through the park—have a way of making civilization feel distant, but views of Bellingham emerge from the top of a 41-foot observation tower.