Road trip day 6 - Seattle to Montana

The drive east through Washington was really interesting. We took the 90 from Seattle and the first few hours of our drive were really beautiful. The Cascade Mountains were stunning, and we’re looking forward to returning to the area for more exploring. The terrain in the middle of Washington was completely different from the western side. It was flat with brush covering the ground. Everything looked dry, despite the nearby bodies of water. It looked like desert.


We were so happy when we finally reached Spokane. Spokane had more character than anything we had passed in the hours since the Cascades, but we didn’t stop to check it out. Our destination for Friday night was a little town past Sandpoint, called Noxon, MT, which is just beyond the border of Idaho. We arrived to Bubba and Cheryl’s house around 9 at night (mountain time). They were waiting up for us with pizza from the local Amish market. We stayed up late talking about our trip before heading to bed, with plans of riding 4 wheelers the next day.

Road trip day 5 - Seattle

After sleeping off our food comas the next morning, Clint and Caitlin and I went to quite possibly the best coffee place ever – Zoka’s. Zoka is in Tangletown, aptly named for the twists and turns of intersecting roads. Most places in Seattle take their foam seriously, decorating each cup with a leaf or heart or some design. Besides good foam, Zoka is set apart from other coffee establishments by the flavor of the espresso, and the perfect and consistent proportions of coffee to foam.
After our morning coffee, we went into Ballard to walk around and check out the shops. Ballard is one of Caitlin’s favorite Seattle neighborhoods, and the drizzle made it a good day for heading into the shops. There are all sorts of cute artsy boutiques in Ballard, and we spent a few hours walking around before we were finally hungry (the previous nights’ feast really did us in).
We headed to C & J’s favorite Thai restaruant, Jhanjay.  Jhanjay is a vegetarian restaurant, which suited us just fine. When we lived in San Francisco, Clint and I always frequented Best of Thai, located on Haight St. We never ordered meat with our Thai food, even though it was available to us, so we almost didn’t notice that meat was not even offered. We ordered Pad See Ew, red curry with pineapple, and vegetables that were covered in a thick, sweet peanut sauce. Everything was really good.
We left Ballard shortly after our late lunch to run a few errands. We went to the flagship REI store to get a camp lantern and I also got some winter boots. Then we headed home to watch the Giant’s game again. After the game, we went into Capitol Hill for a late dinner. We went to a tapas place called Tango. The food all over Seattle has been really fresh and tasty, and Tango was no exception. Turns out we were here during food week. This is the week that many good restaurants offer a prix fixed menu. As Tango is a tapas restaurant, we were able to order a lot of different foods to share. We love that. Variety is the spice of life, after all. Of honorable mention were the Penn Cove mussels, the ‘cheap dates’ (dates wrapped in bacon), and the duck confit salad. We also had Caitlin’s all-time favorite dessert: the El Diablo. After our late dinner, we called it a night; it was our last night in Seattle.

Caitlin took us to Zoka’s on our way out of town, and Clint and I headed east towards our next destination, Montana.

Road trip day 4 - Seattle

We walked past the original Starbucks, and headed across the street into Pike’s Place Market. Pike’s Place is similar to the wharf (pier 39 in SF), but is more of a functioning market. It’s touristy, but overall we got some great food at decent prices. The vendors were all friendly, and since it was a Wednesday, it wasn’t too crowded.
We picked up some oysters at the popular fish throwing stand. I was unfamiliar with the Penn Cove oyster, so one of the workers shucked it for me to try on the spot. You can’t beat that! Turns out that Penn Cove is also well-known for mussels. The Penn Cove oyster was really good, with the typical oceany taste, and not too sweet. The Penn Cove oysters were only $8.99 a dozen, so we picked up 24 Penn Cove, and 12 Kumumoto oysters. Caitlin also got a dungenous crab, as she doesn’t really eat oysters.

We also picked up all sorts of fresh produce at the market place: local and wax-free apples, beets, carrots, radishes, lettuce, and parsley. Caitlin also got a huge, stunning bouquet for only $5. The real treasure, however, was the locally foraged chantrelle mushrooms. In the bay area, these babies go for a lot more, but at the market, they were only $7 a lb! Of course we got a bunch! Our game-day feast was getting big, but we kept getting inspired by the food. Clint and I really didn’t want to head east without first having some seafood, and Seattle is certainly the town for that. At this point, we really weren’t sure if we would be staying another night, so we had a lot of food to fit in. We’ve kind of been letting the weather dictate our travels, and squeezing in seafood was really a must.
I started to get hungry after all of this shopping, so we headed to the Crumpet Shop. I had visited the Crumpet Shop on my last visit to Seattle, after hearing about it from a Seattle-SF transplant. It’s just around the corner, and is the perfect spot for a quick and casual snack. They make the crumpets there, in the traditional English fashion. I got a crumpet with pesto, tomato, and parmesan. Clint had his with delicious blackberry preserves.
After our little break, we bussed back to Caitlin and Justin’s to unload our goodies. We figured we needed some local Seattle beer to enjoy with our meal, as well as the game, so we piled into Clint’s car to get a growler. We headed to Fremont Brewing, which is guess where? The Fremont district. We settled on the Abominable, their dark holiday blend. I learned that a growler is 64 ounces of beer, which is actually a great deal for a local beer drinker. For $15 we picked up our first growler; a growler refill is only $8! After picking up beer, we stopped by the infamous troll, under the bridge.


After picking up our beer, we headed to the new (it’s moved) Archie McPhee! Yay! I encourage all of you kids to check this site out, especially if you love oddities, treasures, and toys. We picked up a few trinkets and then were back on the road.


Justin got home shortly after we did, and I started food prep while the Giant’s started to play. Before long, the Giant’s had the lead and everyone was in the kitchen chopping and shucking and mixing. The four of us put out an awesome spread: winter salad, fresh bread with butter, chantrelle linguini, oysters with hogwash, and fresh cracked crab. Oh! And champagne and beer! It was so good. Luckily, I’m still full so I don’t have too much food envy while I type away.

Road trip day 3 - Portland to Seattle

We left Portland on Tuesday morning, around 11 am. The drive to Seattle was easy and uneventful, although I think we got lucky. The 5 North got more and more congested as we approached Caitlin and Justin's abode.
Caitlin was waiting for us at home when we got into town and we unloaded a few things before heading out for food.
Before I go further, I'll preface this posting with a warning. Nothing of excitement will be posted below, unless of course you are a glutton. I am a glutton, and so our entire 3 day Seattle visit is centered around food. If such things bore you, you have my permission to skip this posting.
Our first food stop was in the section of Seattle known as Fremont. Seattle has all sorts of named neighborhoods, similar to San Francisco or New York. Maybe that's how most cities are; I don't really know.

Anywho, as I said before, our first stop was in the neighborhood know as Fremont. We were feeling a little gross after our fatty food binge in Portland (delicious as it was), so opted for soup and sandwiches at Essential Baking Company. The yam and white bean soup I had was fantastic. It was not a creamy soup, as I had expected. It was a clear broth vegetable soup, with yam cut up like pieces of carrots. 



Caitlin had to open the pub around 4, so after our late lunch we drove over to the Montlake Alehouse, in the Montlake district. We hung out at the bar for a few hours drinking beers while Caitlin worked. The other patrons were really friendly. I'm not sure if we're just jaded from life in the city, or if we're more approachable now that we're unemployed and on our road trip, but either way we've been happily surprised by how friendly everyone is.

Justin met up with us once he got off work, and before too long Caitlin was able to leave work so we could have our next meal. We're a bit worried about finding good ethnic foods as we move into the center of the US, so having both Thai food and sushi while in Seattle were musts.

We ended up finding a great sushi restaurant in the International District called Maneki. Yelp is so helpful sometimes; this place was really cool! We were given a tatami room, which was fun. The table has leg space beneath it (thank goodness! I am not flexible enough to sit comfortably with my legs crossed while at dinner). We ordered sushi, black cod collar, miso soup, and various vegetable dishes. It was way too much food, but the elderly lady taking our order did not seem happy with how much food we were ordering.

I've overeaten every single day on this trip.

We called it a night after our sumptuous meal, and Clint finally showered. (no showers in the state of Oregon!)

Wednesday was a really nice day in Seattle. It was the first of our road trip days without rain. Clint and I slept in and then went for a jog around Greenlake. The loop around Greenlake was bustling with people, the water was sparkling, and the trees were showing the fall colors. In short, it was beautiful out. It felt good to stretch something other than our bellies.

After our run, we took the bus into downtown Seattle, where we met Caitlin for coffee and breakfast (brunch by this time) treats. Macrina bakery is located in Belltown, just a few blocks from Pike Place Market. I highly recommend the sugar cookies if anyone is in the area.

As most of you know, the first World Series Giants game was Wednesday, so we planned on picking up seafood at Pike's Place and making dinner in.

As it is 1 am, this post will have to be TBC. I'll pick up later at our Pike's Place feast. Here's a teaser:

Road trip day 2 - One Day in Portland

After going to sleep after midnight, we woke at 6:30 am to take the car in for an inspection.

The brakes!  Agh!
We could feel and hear the brakes grinding as we were coming into the neighborhoods of Portland late the night before.  As suspected, we needed new brakes.  Luckily getting the work done was completely hassle free and much less expensive than feared!  All parts were on hand and installed in about an hour.  Rather than waiting on the work we went out for breakfast with Brian to Pine City Biscuits.  Brian thought it would be a good idea to give Lauren a warm up of some southern style breakfasts.  We had breakfast sandwiches with homemade biscuits and a wide array of toppings.  Mine had fried chicken, a fried egg, bacon, and was all topped with sausage gravy!  yea!  This place was so good. We recommend it!
After breakfast, we picked up the car as it was already repaired. This delicious layer of grease prepped our stomachs for the beer tasting, which followed next.  We headed to a new brewery, Cascade Barrel House; a local maker of Sour beers.

Look at that variety! Cheers!

After beer tasting, we picked up Owen and Chet from school. We then made a stop at Voodoo Doughnuts; known for many of their specialty doughnuts, including the Voodoo Doll; the Old Dirty Bastard, and an array of other specialty doughnuts.

The Wayson boys at Voodoo Doughnut

After our Doughnut binge we did some pumpkin carving with the kids.  Luckily for us, Brian and Sarah have their own pumpkins growing in the yard, so we were able to pick them out fresh and go directly inside for carving.

Owen and Chet with their pumkins

For dinner, we walked from the house to the Kennedy School; which was really cool.  It's an an old Elementary School building which was renovated into a Hotel/Restaurant/Hot Pool/Movie Theater/Bar; this building actually contains several bars.  Really cool decor and atmosphere; a lot of thought was put into all of the rooms.  We definitely recommend it. Turns out there are several other similar renovated historical buildings by the same group, the McMenamins, sprinkled throughout Oregon. Hopefully we have a chance to go to another in the future.  Portland seems like a really cool town; cruising around and seeing the neighborhoods was fun; a ton of trees and houses with colorful paint schemes all stood out.  The neighborhoods we saw all seem like they have character and were really picturesque, as all of the trees are changing colors at the moment.  It really seems like a great place to live.

We've had a great time on our road trip so far. It's so awesome to know people that really go above and beyond to show us a good time. Brian and Sarah (and Chet and Owen); thanks for hosting us!

Road trip day 1 - Sonoma to Portland

We left Sonoma just after 9 am on Sunday morning.
We arrived in Portland just after 11 pm on Sunday night.
It didn't take the whole time, despite the constant downpour. A brief overview of our day
:The drive through northern California was pretty uneventful. Our first non-bathroom stop was for lunch in Shasta. It was very wet and pretty cold, so we ate pre-packed sandwiches in the car. We did have a nice, albeit fairly obstructed view of the lake though.

The lake Shasta area was really beautiful. Trees were starting to turn yellow and orange, and the soil looked really red. We'd like to come back to Castle Crags and the lake and explore this area some more.
We'd also like to explore more of southern Oregon. The fall colors coupled with the green landscape was really something. There seemed to be endless rivers and valleys on our drive on the 5.
Our next major stop for the day was in Corvallis. In August, after loosing our jobs, we went on a backpacking trip to Henry Coe State park. Some friends of Jesse also came along, who now live in Corvallis. Even though we only met once, Carrie and Drew invited us over for an incredible dinner. They made a hearty bean, ham, and veggie soup and a winter vegetable salad. Almost all of this came from their garden. I'm very impressed!

Carrie's salad with home grown carrots, beets, and parsley

Dinner was followed by a delicious homemade blueberry pie (still warm!) and vanilla ice cream. I guess it's true that the way to ones' heart is through the stomach...

After our feast, Drew and Carrie gave us some insider tips to exploring Utah's parks. They also sent us off with detailed maps and directions. We are so excited. I'm pretty sure Clint would be okay scratching the rest of our road trip plans and heading straight to Utah...Too bad for him.

Thank you so much, Carrie and Drew!

We left Corvallis after 9 pm, and headed straight up to Portland. It was pretty late when we got in, especially considering it was a school night, but Brian was up waiting for us.

The road trip fun continues for us tomorrow...

Happy Birthday, mom!

White gravy just for you!