Today was a travel day with just one interesting stop, in Seattle, before arriving at Jason and Kate’s in Portland. Leaving Chilliwack the land flattened out and we entered a fertile valley of farms and growers of all sorts. As we neared Seattle the land started rolling a bit but nothing like we had been experiencing, Mount Rainier was off in the distance with it’s top shrouded in cloud. The GPS in the car took us right into town to a parking lot next to Pike Place Market.
Everyone and their brother were here today, as I imagine that it was a day off for most and vacation week for others. Pike Place market sits on the bay in Seattle and is a huge ‘farmers market’ selling just about everything, especially food from the sea, vegetables and flower - but a whole lot more, mostly handcrafted items. We had lunch at the Athenian Seafood restaurant and sat overlooking Elliots Bay - Carol had Salmon and I had Cod, after a bowl of mussels of course. What a treat.
Back in the market Carol found the perfect bouquet for Kate, and we started wandering back toward the car past bakeries, cafes, a cheese shop that had a line out the door and around the block, (looked like the opening of Star Wars) and we went into Seattle Cutlery, just look, and as I was chatting with the young man behind the counter talking about keeping things sharp, he took my jack knife and put a new edge on it. I had left my sharpening stones at home. Nice store and lots of great knives, kitchen knives, jack knives, and hunting knives — great store.
Back on the road, we began to experience a lot of traffic and the pace slowed a bit but we arrived Jay and Kate’s just after 6:00. What a great reunion we have been having. It has been quite a while, way too long, since we last got together. We tried to catch up with everything but there is just too much to catch up on, we went out to dinner a great spot called ‘Fire on the Mountain’ and chatted more… a great evening.
And by the way, Happy 4th of July, God Bless America.