Pike Place Market and the Original Starbucks

For my last day in Seattle, we decided to go to the Pike Place Market, the oldest continuous Farmer's Market in America. This also happens to be the place where the original Starbucks is located. As a Starbucks gold card holder...it's kind of a pilgrimage for me to visit the first Starbucks (I know, awful but it's a must!).

We started off the day with a nice breakfast at Lola's in Belltown where I had a Mediterranean octopus and sweet corn. Yum :)

Eggs sunny side up...my favourite <3

Pike Place Market is located right by Seattle's waterfront and it was pretty busy for a Tuesday morning. 

The first thing you see as you enter the market is stalls of fresh fish on ice. 

So fresh that one of them moved!!

On the other side of the fish is a whole wall of fresh, beautiful flowers.

Just outside the market is access to the Seattle waterfront area. Great place to sit down and enjoy your cup of coffee. :)

Beautiful day :)

There was even a totem pole here!

Love my west coast totem poles!

Across the street from this little area is where you can find the original Starbucks, and their original (brown) logo.

Of course there were a bajillion people at the location, trying to snap a picture and get a souvenir.

Unfortunately, you can't actually sit down for a cup of coffee here but they do sell special cups and mugs that are not available at their other locations.

Hope you've enjoyed my adventures in the Pacific Northwest so far, I know I have :). Have a good one :D !

Exploring Beautiful Victoria BC

On the agenda today was a short trip to Victoria, BC on Vancouver Island. However, the thing I was most excited about was taking the Seaplane from Seattle to Victoria. 

I first saw these small airplanes when I was in Vancouver earlier this year and I had thought to myself at the time wow! That looks so cool! I really wanna try that :D.  I saw an ad for Seaplane rides to Victoria and jumped on the opportunity. This particular model  we went on took about 10 people (including the pilot). 

Once you're in the air, you fly over the Strait of Juan De Fuca and take in the surrounding islands, the mountains and the beautiful waters.

Once we got to Victoria, the sun started shinning and the weather took a turn for the better.

Victoria, is the capitol of British Columbia and there are many remnants of its colonial days in the inner harbour. It's also one of the spots with the nicest weather in Canada.

Lots of horse-drawn carriage rides available through the downtown core.

 It's just such a picturesque little town with all the pretty flowers hanging.

The BC legislative building overlooks the harbour and is probably the prettiest provincial legislative building I've ever seen ( I've been to all 10 provinces and have seen most of the legislative buildings in Canada)

Really green grass too :D

 Since I've been whale watching three times in my life and have never seen a whale before, I'm much happier to take a photo of the landscaped orca instead of go on another whale watching trip to be disappointed :)

I like this much better then whale watching

We ended up renting bikes to go around Victoria. After some wandering, we ended up at Ogden's Point where the view was amazing!

Too bad it was so cloudy, it would've been nice to see the mountains

I was pretty happy about getting to bike though :D

After we returned our bikes, we tried the fish and chips shop next door and was very pleasantly surprised.

We got the two -piece salmon fish and chips and it was amazing!! The batter was just right and it was so fresh!

The salmon was sooo good!

 I must say the Pacific salmon in Victoria is definitely very different from whatever-kind-of-salmon I have in Toronto. The colours are a deeper red and the taste is also a bit different too.

We took the ferry back from Victoria and was treated to this lovely view of the sunset :)

 It's been a long but very fun day. I hope yours was as great as mine too. :) Good night everyone.

Good Morning Seattle!

I'm in the Seattle area for a short trip over the next few days, so I thought I'd start blogging about what's happened so far.

The weather this morning was pretty amazing, warm, sunny and just a slight breeze in the air. We started our day off with brunch at Toulouse Petit,  a restaurant near our hotel in the Queen Anne area of Seattle. 

According to the restaurant menu, they were the 5th best restaurant in America in 2012 and 10th in the world. Currently, they're ranked #7 in all of the restaurants in Seattle area on TripAdvisors.

Nice and packed for Sunday Brunch

Since coffee is the drink of choice in this town, I decided to get a cup of joe to start my day too. When in Rome, do as the Romans do right?

My first time trying real French press! I loved it!

I got the Pork Cheek Hash with apples, eggs and bits of asparagus. Having never tried pork cheek before, I chose this because I wanted to try something new and also because it was featured on the Food Network Show "Best thing I ever ate".

 

I have to say, the pork cheek was quite tender and flavourful and overall, I really liked the dish and I would eat pork cheek again :). Hey, don't knock it till you tried it right?

I also got a bowl of fruit with granola on the bottom. Yum :)

I love Pineapples!!!

Kerry Park

After brunch, we headed over to Kerry Park, just north along the Queen Anne Street, where you can get one of the best views of the Seattle skyline.

Note: this walk was extremely steep and according to Wikipedia, the maximum elevation was 139 m ( ~46.5 stories). Be prepared to feel out of breathe by the time you reach the top and bring your walking shoes!

Of course, the view from the top was quite worth it.

Ta-da!

We then headed over to the Space Needle and the surrounding Seattle Center area. Seattle, being the host for the 1962 World's Fair constructed the Space Needle and the Monorail for the event.

As you go up the elevator to the observation deck, you get a very nice view of the Seattle downtown area.

I also liked how the McDonald's downstairs was smart enough to paint their logo on the roof.

Once you get up to the top, you get a breath taking view of the Seattle area, Puget Sound and Lake Union.

Loved the view of the small sea planes taking off / landing

Can you find the giant cruise ship?

The small sea planes comes very close to the Space Needle

Its been a fun and exciting day today. Look forward to more updates on my adventures in the Pacific Northwest!

Have a good one everyone :D

A Short Trip to Upstate NY

As summer draws to an end, my family took the chance this weekend for the final road trip of the year. Typically, we go on a really long 10-day road trip each year since my dad loves to drive, but due to scheduling conflicts, we only went on a short 3-day one this time. Our destination this time was Watkins Glen State Park in New York.

This park is a beautiful area in the Fingers Lake region. The park itself is quite small and the hike is very easy. The whole area is a canyon carved by a small river.

You're greeted by this lovely view at the entrance of the park 

If you take the Gorge Trail, you will see the most scenic areas. There are many waterfalls within the park and this was one them.

You can even walk behind it!

 The paths are well maintained and there are small, even steps to climb along the way.

We came right before sunset and was greeted with this lovely view at the Rainbow Falls.

Love the sunlight streaking through

Again, you can walk be hind the area

 There are many bridges throughout the park for you to take in the view.

For the rest of our trip, we went to Corning, NY, a small town that's home to Corning ( the glass company) to check out the glass museum there. This is a fun place to be if you happened to be in the area. They have a contemporary display, lots of glass demonstrations as well as make your own glass beads/items.

Display made with 600 corning dishes.

A lot of the displays were really interactive

This was part of their contemporary collection. All made of glass!

Bonus: Recently, my own family upgraded to smart phones so now we want to use them all the time.

Asians taking photos of other asians taking a photo? I was holding the light on for that display for them

I know this is sad, but the gift shop was amazing too.

All made of glass!

Have a good week everyone!