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Monday, August 8, 2011
Personal Pilgrimage
Market Morning and Karaoke @ Night
This morning I woke up and swam laps in the hotel pool. It was so relaxing and made my sore muscles not ache so badly.
Alethea and I each had a ham and cheese crepe for brunch on our way down to the market. We grabbed iced lattes to keep us energized as we walked through the market stalls. I walked by the original Starbucks - hopefully tomorrow the crowds won't be crazy and I can actually go in the store to take pictures and have a drink. I ate a cheese curd, my first (I think), from Beecher's Cheese. I saw the guys throwing fish and I took a ton of pictures of all the fresh fruit, veggies and fish.
In the afternoon, we took the Underground tour and got to walk underneath the city and learned that the old sidewalks are actually hollow as they used to be skylights for the underground businesses of the city. A little crazy and a little cool. On our way to the tour we walked past a woman sitting outside having a beer and lunch. That seems fine and normal until you add in the three stuffed monkeys of varied sizes who each had a drink of their own on the table (two beers and one water for the littlest monkey). She was also holding a conversation with her lunch guests. Yeah, Seattle definitely seems to have more characters than Portland or any other city I have visited.
Later in the evening Alethea met up with a friend of hers from college and I relaxed in the hotel room. For late night happy hour we met up with our train friends at OHANA - Japanese Polynesian Tiki Bar Sushi Lounge. They had great sushi and drink specials and BONUS...karaoke! We hadn't seen that on the restaurant's web site so we were all excited. All four of us got up and sang - this was my very first karaoke experience if you can believe that fact. My first song was Britney Spear's "Crazy", Alethea sang Paula Abdul's "Opposites Attract" and the guys sang Shakira's "Wherever, Whenever" as a duet. I was later inspired to sing "Fergalicious" and I must say I was proud of my rendition (the bouncer gave me mad props when we left for the night). I totally rapped in front of the entire restaurant...We danced, we sang, and we had a blast!
One more day in Seattle before we're off to Canada!
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Saturday, August 6, 2011
Portland to Seattle
My day started in Portland and ended in Seattle. Alethea and I woke up at her house, walked to Starbucks for breakfast and took the bus downtown to the train station.
Our train left Portland at 12:15 and while we were waiting in line for our seat assignment (yes, it makes no sense that we had already checked in at the kiosk to print our ticket and then wait in another line for our seat number/car to be assigned) we met a girl named Kim who was heading to Seattle to meet with friends. All three of us sat and waited to board the train; we ended up being seated together too.
We settled in on the train, took pictures of the guy who fell asleep across from us with a sweatshirt on his head, and talked back and forth. They are such a nice couple! Eventually Alethea asked where the awake guy (Adriano - Italy) and the asleep guy (JP - Spain) were from...which sparked a conversation between the 5 of us for the remaining 3 hours of our train ride as we ended up being delayed a little over an hour due to an unexplained "incident" on the tracks. We were the loud laughing people on the train and it was great fun. We all friended each other on Facebook before we went our separate ways once we finally made it to Seattle.
Alethea and I hauled our luggage a mile and a half on foot to our hotel - we passed 5 Starbucks and 2 Seattle's Best coffee shops on our short walk. Crazy. Oh, and lots of homeless people and at least one heroin whore who had track marks all the way up and down her arms and legs. Welcome to Seattle. Don't worry Mom, that's not the side of town where our hotel is located, we're on the good side of the tracks.
Once we had checked in and dropped our bags in the room, we headed down to the hotel bar to enjoy a beer during happy hour. We decided to leave and walk a bit to find a place for dinner. After walking around for 30 minutes or so and checking menus, we decided on a Mexican restaurant called Mama's Mexican Kitchen. Alethea texted our new European friends and 30 minutes later we were all seated together in the back of the room "Jelping" (or looking places up on Yelp.com said with a Spanish accent) to see what was good/recommended to do in town during our stay. The guys had been wandering around town sightseeing, they took pictures in front of the original Starbucks and didn't know that it wasn't the original location - Alethea and I were very amused.
We plan to meet the guys for late night sushi tomorrow night. I'm not sure what is on the agenda for our Sunday, but I am sure that it will be busy and entertaining!
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Friday, August 5, 2011
Top of the falls!
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