Thursday, January 5, 2012

Sleepless in Seattle... sort of.




Last time we spoke I was on a ferry to Anacortes. Our story continues 3 bus trips, $3 and 3 hours later. (buses seem to be really cheap in Northern Washington, just incase you were wondering)

I had the privilege of staying with a friend I’d never met, Mindy, just north of Seattle. I seriously think Mindy could get a second job as a tour guide. In the three days I spent with her we travelled everywhere!



Day 1 started with SNOW! White New Years are the new White Christmases.

We spent the day seeing the sights of Seattle (I like that alliteration). I think I saw everything!
The Space Needle,


 the original Starbucks,

a place where they make cheese in big tubs,

Pike Place Markets (where they throw fish and get really excited about tips),


Gasworks Park and other locations from 10 Things I Hate About You (I may need to watch this again...),

A giant troll under a bridge...(of course)


We also watched some boats go through the locks. It’s a really cool process to watch. There were no salmon climbing the ladder that day.
We finished the day with frozen custard... which sounds very weird, but tastes a lot like ice-cream.


Also the cups were made of corn.

Because it was New Years Eve, we watched the movie New Years Eve. Ha. We went home and re-watched the New York, Times Square ball drop. People there were even wearing the same blue hats as the movie! Weird.


Day 2 was an adventure over the mountains. We drove (ok, only Mindy drove... but stay tuned) through Narnia to get to a German town called Leavenworth. The drive was probably the prettiest drive I’ve ever been on.
Leavenworth was also lovely, it looked a bit like a German North Pole. It was fun to see snow & look in cute shops. The funniest shop was the ‘Australian Shop’... there was a distinct lack of Australian things in there.  There were so many lovely  things to look at, and I even found the inspiration for the next ‘twin wall project’ (except I forgot to take a photo of it, because I was too busy planning where it will go in my house).
When we got back to town we had Mexican & saw another movie, We Bought a Zoo, with Mindy’s sister. The burritos at Baja (is that what it was called?) are massive... I don’t know that it is humanly possible to eat that much burrito... or maybe it’s because I had waffles for lunch.





Day 3 we went to the coast. It was windy.
Really really pretty.





But windy! Haha.

We drove down an island from the Deception Pass Bridge

To the Ferry.

And this time I actually did drive... but only straight. I think I’ll save turning for another day. Eek!

On the way we stopped for Krispy Kremes. Yum! And we walked across most of the bridge (it was very windy). And we also stopped at Fort Casey. You can actually climb all over the fort, except for the doors that are locked. There was a great view of the ocean.


As we walked along the beach a storm rolled in. With the wind the rain felt like needles poking us in the face. It made for some good photos... half squinting type ones. Haha.



The ferry took us back to the mainland, it was fun to be in a car on a boat. I’ve ticked that one off my “things I’ve never done before” (I’m up to thing #16 now). We finished the day with a dinner of breakfast and dessert then watched a long but lovely movie.

It was the funnest New Years weekend I can remember having. Thanks so much Mindy! It’s fun to have a friend in this time zone, I’m looking forward to catching up again sometime!

Oh yeh, and the title... well I think I am stuck between two time zones... or maybe I am just in holiday mode. It is really hard to go to sleep and get up at a normal hour here... I think I should be in Hawaii or Samoa or something. Then I would be fine.

OH! Something else I learnt in Seattle – America has dollar coins. They just don’t use them. I got 10 from a machine this one time. It’s fun paying for things with them, because the cashiers do a bit of a double-take, and sometimes they give you a chocolate coin. Ha.

PS If you want to see more pictures of my adventures, they are on facebook.

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