Pacific Northwest Vacation - Day 1: Seattle

It's been a tough year and a half. As Kai has now finished his junior year in high school, and with adulthood rapidly approaching, a lot of my hopes for Kai have been reset in the past year. I've grown more discouraged about his future.

The three of us have been feeling a lot of stress so we welcomed the end of the school year and looked forward to going on a trip. With all of us now fully vaccinated, and the country starting to open up again, we decided to fly out to the Pacific Northwest for this year's summer trip.

We flew out this morning and arrived in Seattle midday. Kai was anxious about going to the airport and being on a plane again, but the flight was smooth and he seemed to enjoy the plane ride.

It helped that he had the window seat as he took interest in the scenery, particularly as we neared Seattle. He took a lot of photos!

We had great views of Mount Rainier.

After we landed, we checked into our hotel and then walked over to Pike's Place Market.

Kai loved seeing all of the fresh produce.

Everything looked so fresh and delicious. They had such a variety of fruits and vegetables including some unusual things we don't see back home.

While in the market, we found a restaurant where we could have lunch. It was getting a little late but we had plans for a nice dinner so we didn't want to eat too much for lunch. Kai had a bowl of clam chowder and my wife and I shared a bowl of chowder and a crab melt sandwich which came with garlic fries. It was all very yummy.

After eating, we walked around the market a little more. Besides produce, there are several places that sell fresh seafood.

Besides the market, the Seattle waterfront is a fun area to walk around.

Of course we had to see the first Starbucks restaurant as my wife is a huge fan of their coffee. Though a passerby told us that this was actually the second Starbucks restaurant and that the first did not exist anymore.

It was perfect weather for walking - temperature around 70 degrees - and we made our way down to the Olympic Sculpture Park.

After that we took an Uber to the Seattle Japanese Garden.

We had been to the Japanese Garden in Golden Gate Park in San Fransisco and enjoyed it very much. This one was a bit smaller and had a different feel but very peaceful, beautiful, and very well laid out.

It's hard to say which we liked better. They are both great.

After a break back at our hotel, we went to dinner at a seafood restaurant on the waterfront.

We all love crab meat so Kai and I ordered the crab boil comprised of three types of crab legs - snow crabs, dungeness and Alaskan King Crab, while my wife had dungeness crab.

It wasn't quite as good as the garlic-flavored crab we had in San Fransisco, but it was still a real treat. Kai loved the battle with cracking opening all of the legs as much as enjoyed actually tasting the crabs.

By the time we finished dinner, the sun was setting behind Puget Sound.

We were right by the Seattle Great Wheel ferris wheel so we took a ride as the sun was setting.

From the top, we had a great view of Mount Rainier...

...and the Space Needle...

...as well as the sunset.

Kai is afraid of heights but he still enjoyed it.

And thus wrapped up a very nice first day of our vacation.