We left Portland after devouring amazing sandwiches at Lardo. Their slogan is "Bringing Fatback 7 Days a Week." Pete is "pigging out" on a Korean pork shoulder with kimchi, yum!
We had met Nancy and Tim while on a cycling trip in Burma last November. We really liked them, so earlier this year we emailed them about our road trip and suggested we get together. They graciously invited us to stay with them at their home in Tacoma.
They made us a delicious dinner of Copper River salmon, corn and bean salad and grilled asparagus.
Nancy has applied her professional landscape design knowledge to creating a beautiful yard at their house. We enjoyed the scenery while sitting outside and nibbling appetizers before dinner.
The next day we went bicycling from their house to Vashon Island. We rode the ferry a short distance across the Puget Sound.
Nancy has started taking yoga classes, and we practiced with her in the morning. It was her idea to do tree pose for this picture.
Vashon Island has lots of trees with houses mostly hidden from view and almost no traffic. It was an awesome ride!
Tim and Nancy rode from Maine to Florida a few years ago. The trip took 10 weeks, and they carried all their own gear and mostly camped. We enjoyed hearing about their cycling experiences and upcoming trips they are planning for later this year.
We took a breather on the southeast side of the island.
The water here looked really clear and this abandoned fishing pier looked like it might collapse into it soon.
Here we are waiting for the ferry to take us back to Tacoma.
After snacks and beers at Nancy and Tim’s, we drove to Seattle. Here’s one of the more than 20 bridges in Seattle.
We were never far from water. Pete is at the Olympic Sculpture Park with the Puget Sound behind him.
The park was fun to walk around and had interesting sculptures. Kristina is in front of Richard Serra’s Wake.
Behind Pete you can see Alexander Calder’s Eagle.
Echo by Jaume Plensa is named for the Greek nymph who was unable to talk except to repeat the last word someone else said. At 45 feet tall, the sculpture was very striking.
We have wanted to see Rem Koolhaas’ Seattle Public Library building since it was built in 2003. It’s such a cool building!
We took the elevator up to the top floor.
Then we walked down to the ground floor. This is part of the non-fiction Books Spiral that includes four levels of books that are connected through sloping floors rather than stairs. The numbers on the floor show where in the Dewey Decimal System these books are located.
We also went to the Experience Music Project (EMP) museum to see the building designed by Frank Gehry.
Gehry was inspired by the shape of the guitar as he designed the building.
There was rust on the sheet metal seams that we felt enhanced the bronze colors.
While not as impressive as the Disney Concert Hall in LA or the Guggenheim in Bilbao, the EMP building does have some appealing curves.
Our favorite meal in Seattle was at The Walrus and the Carpenter oyster bar. It was a no reservation place that opens at 4 pm daily. We arrived at 5 and had to wait for a table.
We soon found out why – the food was incredible and happy hour included discounted oysters too. Of course we had some! Pete’s favorite was the baywater sweet from Thorndyke Bay.
Duck prosciutto, served with thinly sliced raw rhubarb and fennel, was sublime.
The customers next to us saw this dish and asked what it was. Pete retorted, “Mermaid hair.” Actually it’s pickled beet green thinnings served over Greek yogurt, and it was another favorite of ours.
We left Seattle and headed to Vancouver, stopping along the way for a bike ride in Skagit Valley.
Our friends Tim and Nancy had given us the tip to ride here. It was fun to be up close with the agricultural land and identify the crops we saw growing. There were potatoes, corn, wheat, berries, pumpkins, lettuces and pastureland. It was big open sky country and the clouds were impressive.
We're used to seeing signs to share the road with bikes, but in farmland like this, cars are told to share the road with tractors.
We rode a bridge over the Skagit River.
We split a sandwich in LaConner, which had some charming shops.
We liked this planter because it was shaped like a bicycle.
After a 47 mile loop we got back in the car and crossed into Canada. Pete had found a cute apartment on Airbnb in Vancouver's Mt Pleasant neighborhood.
And pleasant it was! The houses are well-kept with nice yards and beautiful gardens.
There are a few modern homes mixed in with mostly 20th century houses.
We were happy to stay just a block away from a bike thoroughfare, and we rode the tandem on it to Downtown Vancouver and then on to Stanley Park.
Kristina is in front of Science World, which was built in 1986 for the World Expo.
Riding the 15 miles of Stanley Park's perimeter seawall, we enjoyed views of the beaches and Pacific Ocean.
This is a Bernar Venet sculpture entitled 217.5 Arc X 13. He has installations throughout the world and we have been fortunate to see a number of them.
We also rode on some of the Stanley Park interior trails that wind through forests of red cedar and ferns. It is so nice to be able to ride our tandem bike regularly again!
Our favorite meal in Vancouver was at Kingyo Izakaya, which is a small Japanese chain with two locations in Vancouver. We started with octopus in wasabi sauce.
Then we ate vinegared mackerel sushi.
And we finished with broiled yellowtail collar.
Next we'll be on a 9 day meditation retreat, so no beer, no sushi and no blogging. See you in a few weeks!
We had met Nancy and Tim while on a cycling trip in Burma last November. We really liked them, so earlier this year we emailed them about our road trip and suggested we get together. They graciously invited us to stay with them at their home in Tacoma.
They made us a delicious dinner of Copper River salmon, corn and bean salad and grilled asparagus.
Nancy has applied her professional landscape design knowledge to creating a beautiful yard at their house. We enjoyed the scenery while sitting outside and nibbling appetizers before dinner.
The next day we went bicycling from their house to Vashon Island. We rode the ferry a short distance across the Puget Sound.
Nancy has started taking yoga classes, and we practiced with her in the morning. It was her idea to do tree pose for this picture.
Vashon Island has lots of trees with houses mostly hidden from view and almost no traffic. It was an awesome ride!
Tim and Nancy rode from Maine to Florida a few years ago. The trip took 10 weeks, and they carried all their own gear and mostly camped. We enjoyed hearing about their cycling experiences and upcoming trips they are planning for later this year.
We took a breather on the southeast side of the island.
The water here looked really clear and this abandoned fishing pier looked like it might collapse into it soon.
Here we are waiting for the ferry to take us back to Tacoma.
After snacks and beers at Nancy and Tim’s, we drove to Seattle. Here’s one of the more than 20 bridges in Seattle.
We were never far from water. Pete is at the Olympic Sculpture Park with the Puget Sound behind him.
The park was fun to walk around and had interesting sculptures. Kristina is in front of Richard Serra’s Wake.
Behind Pete you can see Alexander Calder’s Eagle.
Echo by Jaume Plensa is named for the Greek nymph who was unable to talk except to repeat the last word someone else said. At 45 feet tall, the sculpture was very striking.
We have wanted to see Rem Koolhaas’ Seattle Public Library building since it was built in 2003. It’s such a cool building!
We took the elevator up to the top floor.
Then we walked down to the ground floor. This is part of the non-fiction Books Spiral that includes four levels of books that are connected through sloping floors rather than stairs. The numbers on the floor show where in the Dewey Decimal System these books are located.
We also went to the Experience Music Project (EMP) museum to see the building designed by Frank Gehry.
Gehry was inspired by the shape of the guitar as he designed the building.
There was rust on the sheet metal seams that we felt enhanced the bronze colors.
While not as impressive as the Disney Concert Hall in LA or the Guggenheim in Bilbao, the EMP building does have some appealing curves.
Our favorite meal in Seattle was at The Walrus and the Carpenter oyster bar. It was a no reservation place that opens at 4 pm daily. We arrived at 5 and had to wait for a table.
We soon found out why – the food was incredible and happy hour included discounted oysters too. Of course we had some! Pete’s favorite was the baywater sweet from Thorndyke Bay.
Duck prosciutto, served with thinly sliced raw rhubarb and fennel, was sublime.
The customers next to us saw this dish and asked what it was. Pete retorted, “Mermaid hair.” Actually it’s pickled beet green thinnings served over Greek yogurt, and it was another favorite of ours.
We left Seattle and headed to Vancouver, stopping along the way for a bike ride in Skagit Valley.
Our friends Tim and Nancy had given us the tip to ride here. It was fun to be up close with the agricultural land and identify the crops we saw growing. There were potatoes, corn, wheat, berries, pumpkins, lettuces and pastureland. It was big open sky country and the clouds were impressive.
We're used to seeing signs to share the road with bikes, but in farmland like this, cars are told to share the road with tractors.
We rode a bridge over the Skagit River.
We split a sandwich in LaConner, which had some charming shops.
We liked this planter because it was shaped like a bicycle.
After a 47 mile loop we got back in the car and crossed into Canada. Pete had found a cute apartment on Airbnb in Vancouver's Mt Pleasant neighborhood.
And pleasant it was! The houses are well-kept with nice yards and beautiful gardens.
There are a few modern homes mixed in with mostly 20th century houses.
We were happy to stay just a block away from a bike thoroughfare, and we rode the tandem on it to Downtown Vancouver and then on to Stanley Park.
Kristina is in front of Science World, which was built in 1986 for the World Expo.
Riding the 15 miles of Stanley Park's perimeter seawall, we enjoyed views of the beaches and Pacific Ocean.
This is a Bernar Venet sculpture entitled 217.5 Arc X 13. He has installations throughout the world and we have been fortunate to see a number of them.
We also rode on some of the Stanley Park interior trails that wind through forests of red cedar and ferns. It is so nice to be able to ride our tandem bike regularly again!
Our favorite meal in Vancouver was at Kingyo Izakaya, which is a small Japanese chain with two locations in Vancouver. We started with octopus in wasabi sauce.
Then we ate vinegared mackerel sushi.
And we finished with broiled yellowtail collar.
Next we'll be on a 9 day meditation retreat, so no beer, no sushi and no blogging. See you in a few weeks!
