We left Unalaska on May 7 and were in Anchorage till the 10th so that I could attend a work related conference. While I was conferencing, Rich was relaxing at the hotel, reading, wandering the mall, AND he went to see a movie in a real theater. :) My conference was good--informative and interesting. After hours I was able to meet with the woman in charge of the ESL/GED program I teach for and I enjoyed getting to chat with her. Rich and I also met our friend Paul for dinner one night and had a great time catching up with him.
On the 10th we flew to Seattle for a few days' stay. We've had fun walking around the city, doing some shopping and eating out. We made ourselves go to the hotel gym a couple of times and we have walked miles and miles every day so hopefully we are canceling out our eating.
Of course we had to go back to Pike's Place Market, which is one of our usual stops. We bought some fruit and bread and snacks for the room so we would not have to eat out for every single meal. However, on this trip we seem to be taking a tour of Chef Tom Douglas' restaurants. He has a slew of them in Seattle and is probably the best known chef from this area of the country. On Mother's Day, we wanted to avoid the big crush of families at brunch and dinner so we went to Serious Pie, Douglas' gourmet pizza place, which was really good. We've eaten at The Dahlia Lounge on a previous trip and this time we also added the restaurants Lola and Etta to the list.
Lola
Night view from our hotel
On Saturday night, we met Rich's old friend Cole for dinner at Andaluca. They hadn't seen each other in many years and I'd never met Cole. We had a great time talking and eating a number of delicious small plates--this was probably my favorite of the restaurants we tried (and not one of Tom Douglas')
Monday, my cousin Rob met us at our hotel, the Edgewater, and we had a great lunch in its restaurant. They had lunch "bento boxes" which included a cup of soup, a half sandwich and a half salad of your choosing. Plus homemade chips. It was super. And really nice to catch up with my cuz.
Rob and me
After Rob left, Rich set out to teach me how to play chess. I have never learned and had a bad experience years ago when my uncle tried to teach me and I ended up just feeling really inept and stupid because I couldn't grasp it. I can't say I did a WHOLE lot better this time, but now I think I could at least tell you how each piece is supposed to move and a minor bit of strategy. :)
Ugh, my brain hurts!
Tuesday, some friends came over from Sequim to hang out with us for a few hours. We met Linda and Ed on our Australian cruise and have stayed in touch on Facebook so we were pleased that they were willing to take the ferry to Seattle to see us. We walked all over the place, chatting along the way, had some lunch, strolled through the market, walked some more and then saw them off to return home. It was really fun to see them again.
The price of Bering Sea king crab
We have not stayed anywhere with a laundromat for this whole trip. I can never go for too terribly long without doing laundry so we've been searching for the right place and the right opportunity to get some washing done! Our hotel would do the laundry for us, but wants to charge $2.75 per piece of underwear and $5 or $6 per shirt or jeans so there was no way we wanted to pay that. This evening we ended up taking a cab to a laundromat a good little distance away, wandered the streets while the wash was going, picked up some sandwiches at the deli next door to the laundromat and now we are in for the night. We have to get up EARLY tomorrow to be picked up at 6:30 AM to go to the airport. Off to Chicago!
