Road Trip Part 2 - Vashon Island and Seattle
Wednesday, Sept 2
Bid farewell to Chris, Dan and Maya, and zoomed north toward Point Defiance to catch the ferry over to Vashon Island. After ferry scheduling snafus, I finally made it to Vashon and over to Kristin & Damon's amazing place around 3pm. Again, another wonderful friend who I hadn't seen in way too many years. Last time I saw Kristin she lived in San Diego and only had one young son, Tomas. Now Tomas was 8 years old, and there were two more - Katherine (5-6?) and Jonathan (3)! I don't actually spend a lot of time around kids, but I have to say, these ones were pretty fun. There was a lot of shyness until I pulled one of my crochet ochibo monsters out of my car and made a gift of it. Soon there was giddy playing and requests to watch them go on the swings or ride their bikes or be pummeled to death by the couch cushions. Katherine even directed Kristin to cut our paper dolls that looked like the ochibo, which she drew eyes on, and let me keep.
Damon was nice enough to take over kid duty so that Kristin and I could go out and have some grownup time together. Downtown Vashon is freaking adorable, and we had dinner and drinks at a lovely place called The Hardware Store. So good to see her and gossip and commiserate over the tribulations of having to deal with family drama and craziness. Is it normal that people in their mid-30s end up having to deal with irresponsible, childlike parents, or is this something specific to the baby boomer generation? Ah well, it's good to know others are going through similar stuff.
After dinner, I caught the Ferry over to Seattle, and settled in at Lauren's place in the cute Ballard neighborhood, my home for the next four days.
Thursday, Sept 3
I took thursday as a slacker day. Lauren was at work, so I slept in, and spent most of the day on the couch catching up with the internet. It was exactly what I needed. When Lauren came home, we had super yum tapas at a place called Ocho, and then came home to catch Project Runway. A perfect mellow day.
Friday, Sept 4
After a lazy morning of pastries and coffee, we headed out to go kayaking on Lake Washington. I'd recently discovered that I love kayaking on the Russian River, which I soon learned was very different than kayaking on Lake Washington. When we set off from the kayaking place, it was a little more difficult than at the river, but not too bad. We passed through a major thoroughfare, and spend a bunch of time in an area called the arboretum - marshes that flowed under the freeways. The underwater plants were so plentiful and visible it felt like that scene at the end of the last Harry Potter movie when they boat over all the dead bodies, but less creepy. And there were so many ducks and herons and turtles and one naked dude and one dude in a speedo. The dudes were kind of creepy. On the way back through the thoroughfare, the wind was way working against us, and there were tons of boats, creating super choppy water that I'd never had to deal with before. Seemed like it took a million years and all my strength to make it back to the rental place. Every inch of my body was aching, but I made it! And after a good night's sleep, the soreness went away, except in my hands. Took about 3 days before I could do things like open up water bottles and squeeze shampoo. Lesson learned about knowing my boundaries! Definitely looking forward to more kayaking in the future.
The rest of friday was spent napping, eating delicious calzones, and being introduced to True Blood, which is my new obsession. Mmmmm... vampires that actually have sex! Yay!
Saturday, Sept 5
This was my day to fulfill a cheesy dream of mine - visit the town where Twin Peaks was filmed. Lauren was kind enough to humour me, so off we went to Snoqualmie Falls. Unfortunately, I forgot to download any angelo badalementi tunes to play on the drive out, but no matter. It was still great to drive through the deep forest on a perfectly overcast drizzly day and check out the Snoqualmie Falls and run around the hotel and the best part: eating cherry pie and drinking a damn fine cup of coffee at Twede's Cafe aka Twin Peaks Diner. To be honest, the coffee was only okay, but the cherry pie was more than damn fine.
To continue with the cheesy theme, we then headed over to Capital Hill to check out the Museum of Mysteries and take their Ghost Tour. The museum itself was a small basement type room with a handful of tiny exhibits on bookshelves about bigfoot, aliens, crop circles, local ghosts, etc... with a big tv showing a documentary on the Winchester Mystery House. Plus a hallway dedicated to the memory of Bruce Lee, which was pretty random. Definitely not as interesting as I'd expected, but kind of worth it for the sheer random, unprofessional nature of the place. There was just one other couple there for the ghost tour, and I have to say, it was one of the most dull tours I've ever been on. It started out okay, with lots of info on the prohibition inspired speakeasy culture of Portland, with a plethora of back rooms and hidden passageways created all over the place to hide the illicit drinking. Plus some fun historical info on the building the museum was located in. But then it quickly went downhill. We snuck out before the tour returned back to the museum for "ghost poker" which was meant to help communicate with the building's main ghost.
Then we were off to a lovely dinner with two of Lauren's friends at a great french cafe, followed by a trip to an actual speakeasy bar, called the Knee High Stocking Factory. It was a tiny, non-descript place in a weird intersection with just the slightest hint of a name outside the door, and a doorbell. Ringing it brought a hostest who looked us over before letting us in. Inside it was basically a multi-room apartment style layout with 3-4 little rooms/lounges along with the bar. The drink menu was based on recession style beverages, and lots of Gin, Pimm's, Cynar, Pisco and Absinthe. I had a Ramos Gin Fizz, and then we called it a night, after a bit more True Blood.
Sunday, Sept 6
Sunday was all about shopping! After a big breakfast in a converted Fire Station, we spent the morning wandering the Ballard Farmer's Market (where I saw purple cauliflower), and the adorable shops in the neighborhood. Man, nothing like adorable boutique and craft shops to make me wish I was rich. I would buy so much cool shit! I was mostly good though, and just bought a few candles, a necklace, two handmade mugs, and a heap of cds.
We tried to go to the Seattle version of McSweeney's 826 Valencia, but it was closed on Sundays. Huge bummer, as it was Space Travel themed, and everything looked like so much fun. Had to content myself with looking in the windows.
Then we went to Pike's Place, my first time actually going there in all the times I've visited Seattle (4-5?). It was neat! Highlights were definitely the mini-doughnuts, and the fish tossing dudes. And man, all those stacks of fresh shrimps and scallops and lobsters were making me drool.
Last bit of shopping was over at the Elliot Bay bookstore, which I was instantly smitten with. I love a bookstore with a whole wall dedicated to staff recommendations, and a really nice huge cafe in the basement. I could spend hours there, but managed to sneak out with a non-obscene number of additional new books, making my final tally of new books purchased on this trip 19. God knows when I'll have time to read them all, but a girl can dream.
Dinner was at Ray's Boathouse, with a beautiful view of the sun setting over Lake Washington. Then it was back to the house for more True Blood and passing out.
Monday, Sept 7
I packed the car up, and we headed over to day 3 of the Bumbershoot festival, a huge festival of music, crafts, comedy, dance, etc... Not too dissimilar to Coachella, but with more of a focus on smaller bands, on stages sponsored by the local radio stations. This is the only festival I've been to in the rain, which was sporadic, shifting from downpours to sunny every few minutes. Did I mention that nearly all the stages were outdoors? Kind of hilarious to see everyone with their umbrellas and waterproof clothes grooving to the music. I don't think San Franciscan's could handle that.
I tried to get into the Writer's of Lost panel, but it was full, so I caught a comedy performance instead. Other than that, we bopped around between various stages catching bits and pieces of a bunch of different bands and checking out the crafts. I'd been considering staying late to catch Metric, who were going on last at 9:30, but by 6 I was feeling tired of being damp, and decided to call it a day and head back to Portland. Before heading back to Chris and Dan's place, I stopped by the Rimsky-Korsakoffee House, which I immediately fell in love with. A cafe set in a funky old victorian building, only open from 7pm to midnight, with live music, amazing desserts, and the best decorations ever. Especially in the bathroom. I so wish there was a place like this in the Bay Area, I would hang out there all the time.
Tuesday, Sept 8
A fast and easy day of driving, I hit the road around 10am and got home around 9pm, taking 5 all the way down, with one stop in Ashland for lunch. Loved driving past Mt. Shasta and Lake Shasta, would love to explore those areas more on a future trip. And then I got to cuddle the heck out of the kitties and the boy.
All in all, a pretty excellent adventure.