WA Mainland

Monday

I'm in Bellevue now. I was looking for a favorite spot of mine, Koot's Green Tea cafe, but it closed. I'm staying at Vasa Lake Resort on Lake Sammamish in Bellevue (look up the history of Sweden's infamous Vasa) for the next night or two. The camping is warm and easy. I can see a mansion up on the hill over the lake -- it might be Ichiro's house.


Sunday

Drove back to Seattle. Got a hotel near the airport so Edita could leave early the next morning. Amusing incident, on the way back, Edita needed a coffee, so we stopped at one of those uniquitous road coffee shacks. Turns out it was called Baristas Gone Wild, and the barista was in a bikini. We kept an eye out for other coffee shacks on the way back, and quite a few of them had these girlie themes. I guess one started as a novelty and the others in the area decided they had to compete.

That evening we went to Seattle, stopped by Ballard locks (saw a few salmon), went to the Portlock store (Edita bought a few salmon) stopped by the Fremont market and (stay tuned for a picture of a fascinating six-person orthagonal bike coming soon). We stopped by Theo and tried all their chocolates. I noticed a Theo signature chocolate bar that had pinenuts and basil (in other words, pesto). Chocolate and pesto, two of my favorite things, so I had to have it, even though it was $4 an ounce. It was very good, but I wasn't blown away:


"Our Limited Edition Basilico Pignoli (Basil Pinenut) bar was featured in the recent issue of EVERYDAY with Rachael Ray. This item is available by special order, please contact us for details."

We stopped by the REI flagship as well. To continue an earlier analogy, REI is the Neiman Marcus of Seattle. Having driven to Ranier base camp, I now get a sense now how much Ranier dominates the Seattle consciousness, as visible as it is from Seattle, how nearby it is, and the outdoor opportunities it has to offer. Without Ranier, there probably would be no REI.

Saturday

Earlier in the week, I had noticed in the paper that the Ranier Mountain Festival was this weekend. Edita has a strong interest, because she wants to climb Shasta, Ranier, and eventually K2 (nuts). So we left San Juan island Sat morning and drove to Ranier Base Camp in Ashford, WA, about 3 1/2 hours. The whole base camp area (store, bunkhouse, rentals) is owned by the Whittakers, a famous climbing family. Copper Creek Inn nearby has very good food, especially the blackberry vinagrette.

The children's playground at base camp has a climbing wall for toddlers. I kid you not (see pics, to follow once we upload them). We camped at nearby Alder Lake.