The Day That Didn’t Go As Planned

So, on day 8 of our trip, our plan was to join Art + Jenene in Seattle.  They were going to go to the zoo while we went to the Museum of Flight.  Then we were going to meet up mid-afternoon, hang out and then go for supper.  We left around 10:00 a.m.  We called Art to see how much longer the scenic route to Seattle would take, and he figured it would add an extra 45 minutes to our trip.  So, we left the freeway and took Chuckanut Drive, which was quite nice.

Love this property

A lot of it was like this

Glimpses of water along the way

That road alone took us 1 hour and when we got to the freeway, we discovered we were only 20 miles further (which would have taken less than 20 min.) than when we started!  We stopped for lunch at McDonald’s in Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island, which is where Art grew up.  That McD’s had an outdoor play area, which we thought was unusual.

This sign made us laugh

We wanted to take the ferry across to Seattle, so as we were pulling up to pay for the ferry, Jared called Art to confirm that we were getting on the right ferry.  Art said, “No, that’s not the one!”  It would have added a few hours onto our already lengthy drive, so I’m very thankful Jared called!  We got directions to the other ferry and continued on our way.

We got on the ferry almost right away, which was nice, and we were at the very front of it, so double bonus!  We couldn’t feel it moving, but could see ourselves getting closer to the land on the other side, so that was strange.

The dock

When we finally got back onto the freeway on the outskirts of Seattle, traffic came to a standstill!  5 lanes of traffic, not moving or just crawling along.  We finally took an earlier exit and made it to the Seattle Zoo with the help of our GPS.  The trip to Seattle would have taken us an hour and a half down the freeway, but because we took the scenic route and a couple of wrong turns, it took us 5 HOURS to get there.  We were tired and frustrated.  When we finally arrived, we couldn’t find Art + Jenene.  We were supposed to meet in the parking lot and they weren’t there.  They didn’t answer their phone the first time we called, so we just waited while the kids played on a play structure.  We eventually were able to contact them and found out that there are 2 different zoo parking lots.  We met up and went to downtown Seattle together and hung out there for a while close to the Space Needle.

We enjoyed this fountain, which I remember from my trip almost 4 years ago.

Art was the first to go down there with Sophia and Kiera watched from a safe distance.

The rest of us followed, but didn’t get wet.

Jared ended up carrying Kiera through the water, which she wasn’t impressed with.  Blake wanted to push Haley around.

It was getting close to suppertime, so we headed over to my absolute favorite restaurant in the whole world!  This was part of the outside of the Rock and Roll Museum.

Once again, we got stuck in rush hour traffic downtown, so what should have been a 5-minute drive took an hour!

This was neat to see a couple of lanes over from us.

Parking is very expensive in downtown Seattle, but we happened to find a cheaper parkade just down the street from the restaurant, so that was a God thing!  We finally ended up here and it was worth the wait! (insert happy sigh)

I like their unique light fixtures.

I decided to try a different kind of meal that I wouldn’t normally order.  It’s called Pasta Da Vinci, which is sauteed chicken and mushrooms (I left out the onions) in a Madeira wine sauce tossed with penne pasta and parmesan.  The description was better than it tasted.  Oh well!  I had the Caramel Pecan Turtle cheesecake for dessert which made it all worth it!

Seattle traffic is nuts, with 10 lanes across and cars darting in + out of lanes all the time, all while going very fast.  We’re definitely not used to that!  Jared didn’t enjoy driving there.

I like the design on that wall.

I like big bridges

I literally cheered when I got this sunset shot!  I took it out of Jared’s window and I had been trying to get the perfect sunset shot for a while.  The colors are just breathtaking!

So, there were some definite ups and downs during our day, but it ended with breathtaking beauty!