A little history behind the planning of this trip. Mommy has wanted to go to Seattle, but the plan was put under the pillow. Since it is summer and daddy thinks the best place to go during the flaming summer is up north to escape the heat. Seattle appears to be a perfect candidate. He soon realized that Vancouver is just hours away, let's go there too. Coincidentally, daddy's coworker told him that the 'most beautiful places' on earth, Banff Canada, which is just 9-10 hours from Vancouver. Here goes the master plan..
Day 0 Houston
The morning before the flight, daddy got a rental car reminder email notification and quickly realized that he made a mistake upon verification. We supposed to get a rental car for 7 days but was only reserved for 6 days, where the pick up was scheduled one day after we arrive in Seattle. To his defense, we changed our plan couple of times and he probably made the booking sometimes during the process. Luckily, he was able to make another booking for the first day; meaning, we would need to come back to the same rental place the day after. No biggie, since our itinerary for the first day is only ~30 minutes from the airport. Phew..
Day 1 & 2 Seattle
We arrived at Seattle late afternoon with Southwest (~$700-$800 each; we used ~52k southwest points with companion pass, for all of us) and picked up our rental car. We explained our two bookings to the representative and she was very helpful in combining the bookings into one so we don't have to come back the next day. Nice. Rental car could get pretty costly especially when it involves a one way rental; where the drop off is at a different location, in this case at a different country. There was a $200 drop off fees! This is on top of a pricey quotes, where most rental companies quoted roughly at $1400 for our 7 days rental. Luckily, daddy was able to apply a promo code to reduce the quote to $550! More power to him!
Had dinner at Paseo Carribbean Restaurant. The food is not as great as we had expected based on the number of reviews on yelp. Boys sitting outside the restaurant waiting for the food.
Enjoying the bonfire at Hyatt hotel rooftop. Space needle is right in front of the hotel.
We stayed at Hyatt House Downtown. We spent about 12,000 Hyatt Points per night that we transferred from Chase Ultimate Rewards Points. Had we not used points, the value of the hotel is about $400 per night! In our case, 12,000 Hyatt points is equivalent to $120.
Following breakfast at the hotel, we went to Kerry Park, overseeing Seattle Downtown. There's a small little park down the hill, which can be accessed with the park steps.
Daddy almost puked and fainted doing this spinning chair while mommy was laughing on the side. Gege has no problem at all. Daddy must be getting old.
Next stop, Hiram Chittenden Lock. Daddy wanted to check out a shoal of Salmon jumping the steps. With a little disappointment, we only saw couple of Salmon jumping up the ladder. We went back again the next day, but still no luck :( On the bright side, we learn about how the locks work to separate the fresh and salt waters with boats going from one side to the other side. Pretty cool stuff. Recommended. Note that the Salmon season is from mid-June through October. With the best viewing through September.
After lunch at Umma's Lunch box, we went to the University of Washington for a quick car tour around the campus while the kids were taking naps. There are some amazing architectures and the campus is pretty big.
We drove back to the hotel and spent the afternoon in downtown. Next destination at Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The foundation has various initiatives ranging from domestic homeless and education to world water and health issues. They go after some of the really hard problem and try to solve in an efficient and effective way.
Chihuly Garden and Glass. A place for beautiful glass crafting and camera/phone snapping pictures. One visit is more than enough.
After a brief stroll at downtown, we took the hotel shuttle (instead of driving and struggling to find parking and it is free) to the waterfront. Dinner at Ivar's, following the driver's recommendation. Food is on a cheaper end, but good and fast. There are other fancy restaurants around but we feel like it largely targeted tourists. We preferred the subtle local food.
Not a big fan of clam chowder, but wow this one was really good! No wonder our driver highly recommended it.
Daddy & kiddos having a great time feeding the leftovers to the seagulls. There is a sign board explicitly says no feeding to pigeon. Do you know why?
Kids playing while we took a break. Last, but not least, the Seattle Great Wheel. A place for goofy selfies. A lot of them.
Next morning before driving to Vancouver, we stopped by the Public Market. Bought few pastries from Piroshky. It's not bad, but sometimes those popular places and their food is just way too hyped up.
Ready for our journey to Canada?
No comments:
Post a Comment