Saturday/Sunday in Seattle

We started out Saturday by doing the Underground Seattle tour. This was a tour that I was told by so, so many people that we just had to do it. Everyone seems to rave about it. The four of us actually weren't super impressed by the tour, however, the story of the old underground city was interesting. I think what we most enjoyed was that it put us in an area known as Pioneer Square and we probably wouldn't have gone there otherwise. It was a very cute area with neat buildings, pretty flower baskets everywhere, and a cute bakery where we got to go for lunch after the tour.

Our tour started off in an old Saloon

Cute Building where our tour started

Walking up above, we passed over several

of these skylights for the underground below

Looking up through the same skylight from below

Underground Seattle

More cute buildings with their flowers baskets hanging out front

I just love ivy covered buildings!

Another ivy covered building where we ate lunch!

Grand Central Bakery

The girls waiting for lunch

From lunch, we headed on to the Washington State Ferry terminal and caught a ferry to Bainbridge Island. We loved this excursion! The ferry ride was fun with great views of Seattle and also cute little beach houses as we past little islands. The trip only took about 30 minutes.

Pretty beach houses on the island

Overboard!

On the way back to Seattle, we saw a

bride & groom on the ferry! AND....

the sunset....AND....

a rainbow!

Downtown Seattle from the water...so pretty

I love this photo!  The city almost looks fake behind us.

Once to Bainbridge, we caught a taxi to The Bloedel Reserve. We loved this! It is an old mansion and huge property that were owned by a wealthy family. Their land is now a reserve with a 2-mile walking path through it. It was so neat! And great to be exploring in the beautiful outdoors.

We first walked through a meadow and past the barns

Andi hanging in the barn

Loved all the trails!

SO green!

Swan Lake

Pretty from the back...

pretty from the front!

Feng Shui?

I wish I could have hung out under that Weeping Willow

for a while.  Reminds me of my childhood on Kohler Circle.

Seriously, SO green!

Ducks or Geese?  We should probably know that by our age.

Hydrangeas!

The Bloedel's House

Peek-a-Boo!

Looking out from in

We were so pumped to see the waterfall!

And slightly disappointed this was all there was to it.

There were some CrAzY trees out there

Look at the roots on the thing!

Peek-a-Boo!

Cute Andi, posing.

The Zen Garden

Can you say GREEN?

I could have sat on the side of the reflecting pool for hours....

if only they weren't running us out of there!

Andi & Jenninfer reflecting

Bainbridge Island Taxi!

After the nature reserve, we shopped a bit in the town of Bainbridge...super cute! I love that kind of shopping. I bought a small, decorative pillow I really liked for 50% off and only $30. I never see cute pillows for that cheap! We also got ice cream at a place that is highly regarded in Bainbridge. It was a cute ice cream shop and quite yummy!

One or more of these hands may belong to a lady who

may or may not have once participated in a scandalous

group of women known as the Blue Rose Bandits.

Cute Ice Cream Shop!

Back in Seattle, we scoped out restaurants for dinner. We started at a Tapas restaurant, but ended up just having drinks there (I'll just say we had some picky eaters with us...I can't believe I've actually gotten to Saturday night without mentioning that)! We ended up at an Italian restaurant I had read about that was pretty good. Again, we were exhausted and ready to head home after dinner!

Our walk to dinner included passing

through the market at night

Andi and I got up early Sunday morning to hike the hills of Queen Anne. The views up there are great and it's such a cute neighborhood.

This is to give you an idea of just how

steep the hills were.

Andi & the City

Once we got back to the hotel, it started raining, which kind of put a damper on the start of the day. I prayed really hard for it to stop so we could enjoy our last day in Seattle and it did!! So, we went on the Ice Cream Cruise on Lake Union. This was so cute and really fun!

Our Boat Captain

Andi and Worley braved the cold and got ice

cream.  I opted for hot chocolate!

We loved seeing all the cute boat houses on Lake Union!!!

The Sleepless in Seattle boat house!

More Boat Houses

An antique Washington State Ferry.  Looks much

like the one we took to Bainbridge, just older!

Two other antique boats that were used for lobster

(or was it crab or salmon or something?) catching

A sea plane flying past the Space Needle

I thought the church up in the hills was neat looking

From Lake Union, we headed out to Ballard, which was another neighborhood I wanted to explore. It was great!! We found a place to get lunch and really enjoyed the shopping here!! I didn't buy much at all, but there were so many stores I enjoyed browsing around in. We also found another Cupcake Royale...yum!

I made my friends walk a few blocks out of the way so I could see Mars Hill Church.  One of the lead pastors there is Marc Driscoll...you may have heard of him before.  He also started a church planting organization called Act 29...my church is an Acts 29 plant!  We didn't attend a service at Mars Hill because I knew Driscoll wasn't there that day.  It was still fun to see...we went inside and used the bathrooms and looked around.

Not true!  But, funny!  This was from the place where we ate lunch in Ballard.

One store in Ballard had some little Kewpie dolls and they all had funny outfits.  The owner got so excited when I told her it was my high school mascot and went to the back and brought out a HUGE bag full of them.  I had fun sorting through them all.

Crazy art in Ballard

Cupcake Royale!  Andi & Jennifer tried some pure sugar cane soda.

After experiencing Ballard, we went to see the Locks and Salmon thingy. Basically, it's a place where they move boats from the ocean to the Lake using an elevator type system (the ocean is below the lake due to a dam). Also, they try to help the salmon get back into the ocean, so there is a lot of salmon to see there! They were huge!

A boat going through the locks

If you look close, or click and blow up this pic, you'll see

a salmon jumping in the air!  There were TONS of them.

Lots of salmon making their way through the locks

Salmon Tail sculptures

Fall foilage, already??

From the Locks, we ventured through Magnolia...a neighborhood we had heard was really nice. It was definitely nice with larger homes with ocean views, but we didn't find anything else too spectacular there. So, we headed back towards Queen Anne, got some pizza slices and FINALLY enjoyed some coffee shop time at a place called Cafe Lladro...I mean we were in Seattle! I don't drink coffee, so I got an Almond Steamer...maybe the best one I've ever had! We played a couple of games of cards and then headed back to the hotel for one more night before our early flights.

Footpath to Magnolia

yum.

It was a great trip! I'm not dying to go back to Seattle, but do have some interest in some of the outdoor activities we didn't get to do like kayaking and hiking. Maybe someday I'll go back!