Seattle

When we left Orcas Island, we headed down to Seattle. It was our 5-year wedding anniversary (Sept 28th), and we spent half of it in the car, though it started and ended well. We had our last kayak outing in the morning, then after brunch headed to the ferry and then had a long drive into downtown Seattle - not to mention that we hit Friday rush hour traffic just as we got there. But we did get there finally. We stayed in a small hotel that took up a couple floors of a building, and they had balloons in there for our anniversary:


Here is a shot of the room:

They put teddy bears in all the rooms, though it's something like $80 if you actually want to take it home. (We didn't.)

For our anniversary dinner, we went to Chandler's Crabhouse, and I want to go back to Seattle just so I can go to that restaurant again. I had this amazing seafood chowder that had clams, shrimp, and crab...I swear it was the best soup I've ever had. I am practically drooling just thinking about it. They were having a Crabfest special going on, and we ordered one of the special entrees. It was 4 lbs. of King Crab, (meant to share - yikes it's a lot of crab) cracked at the table by the restaurant manager. I talked him into letting me take a photo before he got started:

That is way more food than it looks like, believe me. It came with 2 sides - sauteed wild mushrooms with pancetta, and vanilla bean sweet potatoes. Normally I don't even bother with sides when I eat crab, but these were unbelievably amazing. I need to find/create a recipe for vanilla sweet potatoes. We had a nice Chilean Syrah rose wine along with this and it paired up really well. The service was outstanding in addition to the food - I highly recommend this place and will definitely be going back as soon as I can get back out there.

You may have heard how highly caffeinated people are in Seattle...but did you know there are little espresso shacks EVERYWHERE? Not right downtown, but in the non-downtown parts of the city and all over the suburbs. And they all seem to be doing a brisk business. I only managed to get pictures of a couple of them...




Of course we had to go to Pike Place Market - one of my favorite places. I purposely booked us at a hotel that was only a couple blocks from there so we could easily walk.


Sunflowers at one of the flower booths:


This is the famous fish stand where they throw the fish you buy. We didn't have facilities to cook anything, and didn't feel like shipping things home, so we didn't buy anything this time.


Lots of mushrooms:



I also liked the gourmet pasta vendor...crazy variety...look at that one in the front row that is fruit flavored!


And the most intriguing pasta:

I was really, really tempted, but I didn't go for it.

And that was our vacation. Now maybe I can catch you up on the knitting I've done in the 2 weeks since I got back :)

Orcas Island

Orcas Island is one of my favorite places. I don't know if I'd ever want to live there because there is a very limited amount of things to do there, but I love going there on vacation.

Here is the ferry picking us up from Port Townsend:


Waving goodbye to Port Townsend:


These are some flowers I saw at a restaurant while we were waiting for the second ferry, the one that goes to the islands:


The car deck on the second ferry:


The interior of the luxurious Washington State Ferry:


The sock I was knitting on the ferry (and the rest of the trip, but the photo was on the ferry):


Exiting at the Orcas Island ferry landing!


Our inn was a 45-minute drive from the ferry landing - the island is shaped like an upside down U, and is on the opposite end - as you can see, it involved dirt roads:


Photo of the inn, taken from the back:


Our room:



Common area:


This was where we ate brunch everyday after kayaking for 2 hours:


The kayaks:


Paddles up against the outside of the kayaking "shed":


The beach we launched from:


I didn't take my camera out on the water because I know I would have dropped it right in. Someone else did take pictures of us in our boat, but I haven't seen those yet.

One of the resident golden retrievers showed me who was Alpha:


This is one of the Orcas Island deer... They have been inbreeding for years, so they are a bit strange...they have no predators on the island (except cars) and hunting is banned, so these guys are EVERYWHERE.


We did go on a wildlife tour one day...no whales, but we saw lots of harbor seals, sea lions, bald eagles, and a few porpoises. My camera wasn't capable of good photos of that, but I'll try to eventually post some of the ones C got with his SLR camera....here he is on a rare pause between photos:


And finally - what many of you will find most exciting....I had seen this sign shortly after we exited the ferry, and just HAD to go back for a visit to Warm Valley Orchard:


This bumper sticker was on the car in the driveway:

Very promising.

The studio was attached to her house, it felt kind of odd going in there. But it was worth it:







Of course I bought something...the only reason this is all I got was that she didn't take credit cards, and I had just enough cash with me for this:

It's about 600 yards of worsted-weight undyed alpaca. Yum!

On the way out I got a photo of her sheep:


It's too hard to capture the feeling of a vacation in photos, but hopefully you enjoyed seeing it anyway.

Port Townsend

Things are really busy for me lately, so the vacation updates are quite a bit after the fact.

Our first stop was Port Townsend, WA - but on the way there we stopped at the Chateau Ste. Michelle winery (in the Seattle suburbs). We were drinking their wine the night we got engaged, so we went to the winery on our honeymoon and we had so much fun we decided to go back, do the tour, and buy some wine.

I had to chase this guy a little bit to get him out of our parking spot (and by "chase" I mean "walk slowly toward him with my camera"):


On the tour, they happened to be bottling Chardonnay that day, so we got to see:


These are oak aging barrels, also filled with Chardonnay - they have 15,000 of these. Each one holds a couple hundred bottles worth of wine.


This huge barrel (taller than me) is out on the grounds and I just thought it was fun:


In Port Townsend, we were in a B&B that is a former German Consulate. It's very over-the-top Victorian, which is not my style at all, but the owner of the inn is so entertaining we had to go back (we stayed here on our honeymoon as well). Our room:



One of the main reasons we went back to PT was one of the restaurants we'd found there. The Wild Coho is one of our favorites ever. It's just one guy in the kitchen, one server, and 10 tables in the restaurant. Amazing food, and they are members of the Slow Food movement.


Some crostini with goat cheese and balsamic:


My salad was organic seasonal greens, roasted tomatoes, local cheese, and a tomato-rosemary vinaigrette:


C had escarole with caramelized pear and hazelnuts, and a different locally made cheese:


My entree was rack of elk with wild mushrooms:


C's entree was lamb with onion-artichoke risotto:


I would have made reservations for a second night but unfortunately they are closed Sunday and Monday so we had to make alternate plans for Sunday.

Here is a view of the Admiralty Inlet from the edge of town:


This was a fun weathervane I couldn't resist catching a photo of:


Next vacation installment will be the San Juan Islands. :)

Fetching

Knitted while on vacation!


Pattern: Fetching by Cheryl Niamath
Yarn: Knitpicks Andean Silk
Needles: Size 6 DPN's

Started: September 22, 2007
Finished: September 23, 2007

I didn't really believe the pattern when it said you could knit these in a weekend. But I knit the first one on the 4-hour plane ride to Seattle, and I knit the second one the following afternoon/evening as we hung out at the B&B and had tea and snacks. I wore them all week while I was in WA, but it has been too warm at home since I've gotten back. I love these and look forward to wearing them again.

Where have I been?

I'm still sorting through the photos, but this will give you an idea:


And yes, there was knitting on the trip :)