Seattle Nov 2008
Submitted by Gretchen Winters St Cloud ofice
I was in Seattle for 1 week earlier this month and had a great time exploreing all the city had to offer. We did some sighseeing and I have a couple of really fun tours to recommend. The first one was a walking food/history tour of Pikes Market call "Seattle Bites" Food Tours www.seattlebitesfoodtours.com. We started the tour at the Seattle Art Museum and then continued over to Pikes Marlket. We had serveral good size food tastings in the market. Some of the best were the Smoked Salmon Flatbread with Creme Fraiche at "Taste", authentic New York deli bites (imported from the Big Apple!), Paris inspired fruit and Nutella crepes and ended the tour with a fun wine tasting at an Itallian market. All of these tastings were paired with interesting soda's from the Dry Soda Co www.drysoda.com. Very good value for the $39.99 ticket price. And a great way to experience Pike's Market! We also did the Seattle Underground Tour which really gave us some great insight to the history of the city. We took the ferry over to Bainbridge Island which was a fun way to see the city from the water. If you are lucky enough to know someone with a boat (which we were) have them take you for a boat ride on Lake Washington. The houses are pretty spectacular especially Bill Gates home. It was also fun to see the neighborhood of floating houses and the UW campus from the water. If you like hiking there are some great hikes about 30 minutes east of Seattle near North Bend. One is Twin Falls where the hike takes you along a river up to a pedestrain bridge over the river where you can see both falls cascading down the mountain. Another is Rattlesnake Ridge where you get a real workout but it is worth it when you get to the top for the breathtaking views. A must when you are in that area is to visit Snoqualmie Falls and stop in the Salish Inn for a drink. Great wine tasting in Woodinville too. And another fun option for the day is to visit the Olympus Spa in Lynnwood. Great body scrubs and other treatments and included with these services are use of the
reading room, meditation room, log room and different hot tubs and steam rooms. Seattle has many great restaurants. A couple I would suggest are Steelhead Diner with a great menu choices, Taste the restaurant in the Seattle Art Museum because they use all locally grown fresh ingredients and the Pink Door which has Italian-American cusine and a Cabaret show.